Podcast: How PM optimization improves reliability and reduces unplanned downtime

PS: Let me bring something which is subtext up to the main text, which is that when this team put the PM optimization plan into place, they did something really important – they did what they said they were going to do. It was 2 hours. It wasn't more. They resisted the temptation to fix things. And so you've got this new reputation, if you will, or a different kind of attitude coming from that team, and the operators can sense, “OK, yeah, they did what they said they were going to do.” It was an investment in future PM’s, because with this one, they absolutely adhere to the terms of the agreement with operations.

BH: Definitely. Building trust gives you the opportunity to expand and do it in other places. Now the organization as a whole has transformed two years ago from struggling to keep up with production month after month, and now they've actually hit a point where I think they're like 6 or 8 months above production goals. They've been really, really doing well. It's been a slow journey, but that journey is a steady journey and it doesn't have that volatility, and it's just continuous to grow a little bit every month.

PS: This reminds me too, of something which Klaus Blache down at the RMC in Knoxville, always says, which is that so many success stories, if not all of them, start with this: “here's how operations and maintenance figured it out together.”

We'll get you out on this question, Brian: when it comes to PM optimization, you know the title of your workshop was PM Optimization Made Simple. Are there any specific insights like the one we just talked about – do what you say you're going to do – which are really key to helping these optimization efforts succeed?

BH: Yeah, there's a few and we should get a little bit technical in the conversation because I don't want to leave everybody with, “oh, that was such a great story but how do you do it?” There's always building blocks. When we had the FMECAs podcast last year where we talked about each question is to answer the next question. Everything is the same, PM optimization is the same.

The first thing we need to understand is, what is a failure mode right? How do we define it? I can tell you I've been in FMECAs and I've been in different conversations as a reliability engineer. I didn't have a good grasp of what it is. And if you ask everybody, they might give you different definitions of failure modes and failure mechanisms and part and problem and cause, and how do they all fit together? So the first thing we have to understand is, is that equipment doesn't fail, right? I ask in the class all the time, “does your car fail?” And I get a lot of nods and I say no, you're all incorrect. The car does not fail. The components in the car fail. The head gasket blows. The bearing seizes. The transmission gear tooth shears.

PS: Right. There's no Blues Brothers moments where the car just explodes and dies. It's always something.

BH: Yeah, the car itself doesn't fail, it's the components that fail. And when we look at the P-to-F curve and when we look at the six failure patterns, we're talking about the component or the part that fails, not the automobile or the equipment that fails. So understand that first and understand that every inspection that we do is based on a component, not on the asset.

Say we have a crane inspection. You have a whole bunch of little inspections that are on bearings and couplings and base bolts and hoist reels and cables. Each component gets inspected to make up the crane inspection, which is a PM plan or a PM route, right? So the first thing we’ve got to differentiate is we're looking at each individual inspection point, each individual inspection, not the whole plan by itself. And then we have to look at what is the failure mode or the failure mechanism, or the problem or the cause that is being addressed by the inspection, right? So if we define a failure mode – and we may have talked about this last year, but we'll hit it again – how would you define a failure mode? What's the definition for that? What I will tell you is I don't care if it's technical or I don't care if it's in layman's terms – the failure mode is the deviant behavior of the component.

First, I'm going to say the bearing is a component. The bearing is supposed to spin. What's the opposite of spinning?

PS: Seizing up.

BH: Seizing, right. So be technical, tell me seizing. Be untechnical, say stop spinning or don't spin no more. I don't care how you put it. That is the failure mode, it is the opposite of what it's supposed to do.

And then we go further down. So if the part is the bearing, the problem or the failure mode is the seizure, what is the cause of the seizure? And now we start opening up to the things that we can look for: over-lubrication, under-lubrication, misalignment, contamination, imbalance. All of these things are conditions or causes that lead us to the bearing seizure, but those are things that I can find.

So now if I've defined my part, my problem, and my cause, I can design something to prevent the cause or to find the cause so I can prevent the seizure or prevent the problem.

So that's the first question I'm asking, is does the task as it's written give me any indication of what failure mode we're trying to prevent? And I don't care if it's “look for play in the shaft.” Well, what's the failure mode associated with play in the shaft, or what's the cause, the deviant condition, the deviant state? And I can look between the lines and say, oh, well, that's looseness in the bearing or that's wear in the shaft. There is something that I'm looking for that is the problem. Now I can answer yes to that question. There is a failure mode being addressed with this task. It's just not very clearly stated.

And since I can answer that question, now I can ask the next question. Should we use predictive technologies, or should we do a quantitative inspection, or should we do an objective inspection, or should this be given to an operator for basic asset care? Starting with the foundations and really understanding the definition for failure modes and for part-problem-cause, if we can understand how to wrap our head around that at the component level, then walking through the logic of doing PM optimization becomes much easier to perform and much easier to facilitate.

And then on the other end we encourage all of our customers to write their PM inspections with four basic elements:

(1) The first element is the part and the problem or the failure mode, so “this activity prevents bearing seizure.”

(2) The second element is the cause: “due to under-lubrication,” OK, “this prevents bearing seizure due to under-lubrication.” That's the first thing I want to put on the PM inspection because I want to empower the technician to be able to act on my behalf. I want him to know that his work today has meaning behind it, right? This is not a check in the box. It's not walk out there and go out and check, check, check and turn in the paperwork, it’s not that. It’s “oh my God, you know what I did today? I made sure that we're not going to have bearing seizures in the plant, and I know what happens when we have bearing seizures, it stops production and everything, so my life is meaningful today.”

(3) The third element is the actual activity and the inspection criteria, the activity and the tolerance. The activity might be “grease a certain amount” or “inspection of a certain tolerance” or something along those lines. I want the measurement or the inspection criteria and then also I want the tolerance – plus or minus so much, or this much grease, or whatever, right.

(4) The fourth element is the conditions and the follow-up actions. “If you find this, then do this.” “If you find this, then I want you to do that, but I also want you to write a work request for a for a repair.”

If you can put those four elements together, what you end up with is very small variation in what you get out of the result. Because now, and let's go with an objective inspection, right, if I tell somebody “go inspect the hoses,” that's very subjective. But if I say “inspect the hoses for any presence of bulging or cracks, if it's tangible to the touch or if it's visible with the eye, I want you to report it.” Now when I get down to the conditions, you know, “Condition #1, no visible bulges or cracks.” Record as-found / as-left. Here's Condition #2, “some cracks or bulges were identified.” Record the as-found, write a follow up for repair or for replacement.” Now when I give it to the seasoned guy who's been around and he's been seeing leaks all of his life and he's like, “oh, it ain't that bad, the cracks and bulges, it's not spraying anything so it's just fine.” He's going to ignore it, except that I said, “any presence write up a work request for repair” and now what he provides and what the new guy provides, because I told him “tangible to the touch or visible to the eye, write a work request for repair,” they're going to return me exactly the same thing. And that same thing gives me time to plan and schedule that repair and prioritize it on our schedule, instead of on the machine’s schedule and scheduling the work for us.

PS: Right, all of which is adding up to what you led with, which is to make sure that anybody who touches the machine according to this PM gets the same outcome.

BH: Yeah, completely, and that's really the goal. Those four elements, we call that the gold standard – the part & the problem; the cause; the activity and tolerances; and then the follow up criteria, follow up conditions or actions. We would say that every inspection point, if you have those four things in it, then you are gold and you will be able to do some excellent inspections.

PS: For those who want to learn more after hearing our talk, where can we point them to?

BH: Go to eruditio.com. Of course we do the workshop, you can call us and we'll come run a workshop for you, or come to a conference and you can see the workshop sometime. But if you go to eruditio.com and you click on Resources, we have a brand new page called Job Plan Guides.

What we've done is we've created a Microsoft Word template that is auto formatted that prompts the user for the next piece of information. There is a how-to video that goes with it, so you can download the template, download our worksheet for actually scribbling notes during PM optimization and organizing your thoughts, and then you can watch the video on how to dump all that into the template and really empower your planners or your reliability engineers to start pumping out some excellent, not just excellent as far as content, but excellent as far as functionality and beauty in the paperwork without sending them back to school for how to use Microsoft Office.

PS: Excellent. For anyone listening, you'll find those links already in the show notes in the transcript area. So Brian once again, thanks for the next podcast in our series and I can't wait to talk again.

BH: Yeah, it would be good. Thank you, Tom, and I look forward to coming back.

About the Podcast
Great Question: A Manufacturing Podcast offers news and information for the people who make, store and move things and those who manage and maintain the facilities where that work gets done. Manufacturers from chemical producers to automakers to machine shops can listen for critical insights into the technologies, economic conditions and best practices that can influence how to best run facilities to reach operational excellence.

Listen to another episode and subscribe on your favorite podcast app