Most factories know what they pay for cleaning and almost none know what cleaning costs them. The contract line is easy: a crew, a frequency, a monthly figure. The real cost sits in places the contract never itemises — the machine stopped for a clean that ran past the shift change, the bearing that failed three weeks after a wash-down, the second visit because the first one did not shift the cutting fluid. Add those and the monthly figure usually doubles.
If you want a defensible number for the board, here is the evaluation method we suggest. It takes two weeks of recording and no new equipment.
Start with the area, not with the price list
Break the facility into cleaning zones with different soils and different constraints: machine bodies and surrounds, floors under racking, the areas around the wet process, drains and oil separation, and everything that is only aesthetics. Each zone has its own cost driver, and a single "per square metre" rate smears them together until nothing can be improved. Assign a named owner and a current frequency to each zone so you can see who decides how often it is cleaned.
Expect the frequencies to be inconsistent. On a machine shop floor, the reason is usually habit rather than measured soiling, and the inconsistency is where the first saving sits.
Record what cleaning actually consumes
For one cycle in each zone, write down: labour minutes, water used, chemicals and their quantity, energy, machine downtime, and the time before the area is back in service. Add the items nobody books — the forklift moved to clear the floor, the guard removed and refitted, the supervisor waiting at the end of the shift because the clean ran late. Those are the largest line items in most factories and the easiest to miss.
One rule for recording: measure on a normal cycle, not on a deep clean. A deep clean teaches you nothing about the recurring cost you are trying to control.
Price the failures, not only the tasks
The expensive part of cleaning is doing it twice. Count, over the last quarter, how many jobs were repeated, how many machine faults followed a wash-down, and how many times residue was found in a place that is supposedly cleaned on schedule. Cost each event with downtime plus rework plus labour. This figure is usually larger than the cleaning contract itself, and it is invisible in procurement reporting.
Where the recurring failure is residue — cutting fluid left on a machining centre, oil film on a machine body, grease in a guard that was sprayed and wiped — the method is the problem, not the frequency. A wash that leaves the soil diluted rather than removed is cheaper per visit and more expensive per year.
Compare methods on the soil you actually have
Take the worst soil in your highest-cost zone and run two methods side by side on matched surfaces: your current method, and a high-temperature steam method. Compare time to finish, water consumed, chemicals used, and what a white cloth picks up 48 hours later. In a shop dealing with oil and grease, our factory machinery degreasing work starts from exactly that comparison, because the answer depends on your soil and your access, not on the general merits of steam.
Score the trial on four things only: labour minutes, water and chemicals, downtime including drying, and residual soil at 48 hours. Ignore impressions. Steam usually loses on equipment price and wins on consumables, water and repeat visits; which way that nets out depends entirely on your labour rate and your failure count.
Check the hidden cost of your effluent and your downtime window
Wash-water containing oil and detergent is a cost line, not a free disposal route. Find out where the run-off goes, what your interceptor costs to maintain, and whether your discharge consent limits volume or content. Methods that use far less water move that line as well as the water line, and in some facilities the interceptor and consent obligations dominate both.
Then check what the clean costs your schedule. A method that leaves surfaces wet for hours pushes cleaning into the only window when the line is idle, and idle is the most expensive time in the factory. Time to dry is a cost input, not a comfort issue.
Set the interval from evidence instead of habit
With one method chosen, mark the cleaned date on each zone and inspect at fixed points after it. Set the new interval at the point where soil is visibly returning or where a downstream problem starts appearing, and hold it there for a quarter before adjusting. Over-cleaning is a real cost: extra downtime, extra effluent, and in some cases accelerated wear on seals and electrical enclosures.
Publish the interval with the evidence that supports it. A frequency that nobody can justify gets changed informally by whoever is standing there, and your cost model stops matching reality.
Report one number, and keep it stable
Reduce the whole facility to cost per cleaning hour delivered, with the failure count reported beside it. Once you have three quarters of that series, you can finally answer the question management actually asks: is cleaning getting cheaper, or just getting contracted to somebody else. For an in-house programme the equipment decision follows from the same series — see what we build for industrial maintenance steam cleaning machine duty on our cleaning equipment pages, and check published parameters against your supply and access before anyone quotes.
If you want us to review your zones and soil types before you choose a method, send the layout, the soils, and your current frequencies to sales@powerde.net, or call +86 13023198376. We will tell you where a steam method will not help, and what we would need to confirm before quoting equipment.
