equipment failure vs breakdown

equipment failure and breakdown both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
equipment failure	Yes	No	No	No
breakdown	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, equipment failure and breakdown are synonyms defined as:

equipment failure (noun)	breakdown (noun)
a cessation of normal operation	the act of disrupting an established order so it fails to continue
	an analysis into mutually exclusive categories
	a cessation of normal operation
	(biology) the process of decay caused by bacterial or fungal action
	(chemistry) separation of a substance into two or more substances that may differ from each other and from the original substance
	a mental or physical breakdown