Benefits Of TPM And RCM For Manufacturing Companies

TPM

1 – RCM and TPM

Joseph Storey & co is manufacturing fire retardant products in Lancaster. One of the company suppliers mentioned to the Joseph Storey operation director, Diamond Geoff, that he was planning to introduce TPM after the successful implementation of RCM. This was the first time he has heard of TPM and RCM. You have been tasked by Diamond Geoff to produce a short report on the benefits of TPM and RCM for the company and how they can be successfully implemented.

2 – Maintenance strategy and CMMS

Jones Stroud insulations, part of Krempel group, manufactures insulation braided sleeves for the automotive sector. The company uses SAP as a production and purchasing management systems but does not have any form of management systems in place for maintenance. The company still uses a breakdown strategy when braiding machines fails. You have been asked to produce

(a) Can you explain to the maintenance manager what it means for the business and could you advise other strategies that could be more effective for the business.

(b) Can you research into CMMS and propose 3 solutions for the company. You will need to discuss your choices.

Introduction

According to Meredith and  Mantel  (2011) maintenance, management is to keep the equipments running within the production systems at high capacity to produce high quality products at a low cost. In the earlier stages the simplicity of the product features made it possible for the companies to use simple technical machineries in the production process. However, with the increase in the customization services offered by different manufacturing companies like the car companies and the electronic goods company, the companies have been forced to install complex machines, which require high maintenance services in order to function properly and produce high quality goods. Thus, the importances of maintenance within the companies have considerably increased.

The companies can generally use the Total Productive Maintenance or Reliability Centered Maintenance analysis in order to achieve high productivity levels. The TPM is the method that ensures that every machine within the production process is performing the assigned task with the same output rate. Reliability centered Maintenance is an addition to the already prevailing TPM system however, RCM ensures that minimum safety levels of maintenance are provided within the systems (AlArfaj, 2012).

The report here will focus on the decision strategy of the company which is dealing in the production of the fire retardant products in implementation of the TPM process after they have successfully implemented the RCM process.

TPM is the method of organization of the maintenance process to support 100% productivity and to increase the quality with the help of increased equipment efficiency and reduction of both costs and shutdown frequencies of the machines (Nielsen and Sørensen, 2011). The system ensures teamwork management because in order to maximize the efficiency level of the production systems all the employees are divided into various groups and are made to work in individual groups focusing on a single aspect of the production system. The operational manager further controls the individual maintenance systems and the total operations. Heagney (2011) commented that the major reason for implementation of the TPM system is to ensure zero defects and zero accidents within the production system. The following are the major pillars of the TPM system namely

• Autonomous maintenance
• Kobetsu Kaizen
• Planned maintenance
• Quality maintenance (Copeland, 2012)
• Training
• Office TPM
• Safety, health and environment

RCM

Among the different eight pillars within the TPM system the last pillar is attained by the RCM systems. Thus, the use of the RCM solely within the maintenance of the companies will not be relevant for the companies because the companies will not be able to achieve the other efficiency levels with the sole implementation of the RCM. Hence, TPM is necessary in this respect. In some of the organizations not engaged in extensive production and manufacturing functions TPM is also considered to be the same as TQM (Alaswad, 2012).

Attaining of the overall equipment effectiveness is the main objective of the TPM process. For the attaining of this, three major factors have to be considered namely

• Performance
• Availability
• Quality

TPM = Performance * Availability * quality = Overall Equipment effectiveness

However, Ho and Quinino (2012) commented that all these factors have some significant losses engaged along with the factors namely:

Performance: The major losses associated with this factor are the running of the machine at a reduced speed from the expected speed of the machine. Lai (2012) commented that another disadvantage is the minor stops that may be encountered by the machines.

Availability: The losses associated with this factors are firstly the issues of sudden breakdowns and secondly the product changeover issues.

Quality: In case of quality the problems occur in cases of startup rejections and running rejections.

According to Costa et al. (2012) RCM is the process, which ensures that the production systems should continue to maintain the same level of efficiency and perform the same functions, as it is required to perform without any problems in the system. The system involves identification of the base maintenance program and identification of failure findings tasks within the system. The next step involves the determination of the maintenance safety measures. The major aim of the RCM is to generate employee satisfaction levels by assuring the employees about the safety regulations related to the various functions of the system (Lai, 2012).

Importance of TPM is seen within the management of Toyota car manufacturing in Japan. The TPM is installed in order to eliminate all unplanned downtime within the process. According to Moghaddam and Usher (2010) in majority of the companies the maintenance department is considered to be the unwanted indirect expense bearing department  which suggests that majority of the organizations are not aware of the importance of maintenance management. Since the companies do not realize the value of the TPM hence they undertake different maintenance strategies namely breakdown, predictive, preventative, corrective and improvement strategy. However, Nguyen and Bagajewicz (2010) argued that none of these systems ensures 100% productivity efficiency for the machines. Breakdown strategy involves high maintenance costs and reduces the life of the asset. However, implementation of the TPM will ensure give the companies to rebuild the machines with new parts which will increase the life of the machine and efficiency level will be 100%. Thus, TPM implementation is important especially for manufacturing companies.

Similarly, Zaim et al (2012) if the organizations are engaged in the preventive maintenance strategies like the frequent oiling, greasing and changes of the machine parts then the sudden break down may be prevented but the efficiency levels remain the same. Moreover, Moghaddam and Usher (2010) commented that frequent maintenance functions will make the incur higher indirect expenses. On the contrary, the implementation of the TPM will ensure that the cost is lower and the frequent maintenance activities need not be adopted.

Importance of TPM

In analyzing the importance of the RCM strategy it may be concluded that the major important feature of RCM is the ability of the system to identify the failure modes and hazardous issues within the machines so that the failure can be prevented and occupational health and safety can be ensured. Further, the effects and causes of the machine failure can be detected with the help of RCM system. Reliability is the focus of the system. The companies installing this system aim to increase the employee safety thereby leading to high employee retention in sectors like energy, chemicals and manufacturing companies (Lai, 2012).

In the context of the given case, implementation of TPM in Joseph Storey and Co will benefit the company in the following manner:

• Improvements in the operational efficiency (Verzuh, 2011). 
• Improvements in the quality and reliability
• Reduction of the operational costs
• Improvements in the health and safety of the worker producing the fire retardant products
• Improvements in the production capacity of Joseph Storey
• The TPM has also increased the efficiency levels of the production individuals by providing them professional trainings
• This system thus reduced the absenteeism levels within Joseph Storey Co
• The system further ensures that the fire retardant products are produced at high quality in order to ensure improved customer satisfaction

Since the RCM system has already ensured the following benefits for the company, hence the adoption of the TPM will further highlight the benefits. The following are the major benefits that the company derived from implementation of RCM (Sharma et al. 2011).

• Enhanced levels of workplace safety and environmental integrity
• Reduction in the number of shutdown work lists thereby maintaining the cost
• Reduction in the levels of routine maintenance costs by 40 to 70 % (Applegate et al. 2003)
• Ensures high level of team work and high satisfaction within the employees

The supplier of Joseph Storey Co proposed that he would introduce the TPM process in order to rebuild the production systems of the company so that the production systems will ensure 100% productivity at any level of production requirement.

The major objectives of Joseph Storey Co in implementation of the TPM process are as follows:

• Reduction on the MDT about 20%

Thus, the proposed TPM plan for the company is as follows:

Figure 1: TPM plan for the company

Rajput and Jayaswal (2012) argued that the major difference between the TPM and RCM process is the focus of both the maintenance systems. TPM focuses on the improvement of the efficiency of the machine and machine parts so that the product is of high quality and low cost. On the contrary, RCM focuses on the management and assurance of the safety and security of not only the individuals within the company but also of the productive machines. Moreover, the components that would require ore amount of time limits to rebuild are replaced on conditional basis by the RCM system. The RCM system checks the deterioration level of the machine parts and machines annually prior to expected life and prevents the failure of the machine(Nguyen and Bagajewicz, 2010). This also helps to reduce the maintenance costs. on the contrary, TPM is the process in which the whole machine parts are rebuild in order to ensure 100 % efficiency and consistency for the machine. Campbell et al. (2012) commented that this system thus requires high costs for the company.

Conclusion

Thus, in the given case if the supplier is focused on implementation of the TPM then the company management needs to firstly calculate the amount of revenue and then decide on the implementation strategy. The use of the TPM will ensure that the shutdown rate of the machines in the company is reduced by 5%. The major aim of implementation of TPM in the given organization is to ensure constancy in the production system. Thus, in major organizations the systems are repaired in between the production process in order to ensure that the system does not fail in the middle of the production process. Since the fire retardants are highly in demand and also they are some of the most important products for all kinds of chemical and oil and gas industries hence it is necessary for the company to ensure constant production of the products.

Importance of RCM

After analysis of the RCM and TPM strategies, it may be recommended that Joseph Storey and co can undertake the implementation of the TPM process because the TPM process will increase the efficiency of the machines within the company. However, the company should follow the following recommendations before implementation of the same.

• Recruit employees with knowledge over the matter of maintenance and project management
• Form small group or teams in order to assign them the portion of the maintenance management
• Use CMMS procedures in order to create a work schedule and direct the employees accordingly
• High degree of knowledge and commitment from the top-level managers
• Notify the employees about the change that is about to take place due to implementation of TPM so that the resistance to changes management can be avoided
• Calculate the indirect and the operational costs that will be incurred so that the company can make the financial resources available

A Effective strategies for the business

According to Nicholls (2002) breakdown maintenance or reactive maintenance are the repair strategies that are undertaken by the companies after the machine has already failed. The major focus of the breakdown strategy is to restore the machine to its original form. This is achieved by either replacing or repairing of the faulty parts within the machine system.

According to Wakjira and Singh (2012) implementation of a break down maintenance system affects the operational productivity of the machines since the break down maintenance strategy is implemented when the machine completely stops working.  Moreover, Parks (1979) added that emergency repairs of the machines makes the companies incur up to 3 to 9 times more than the planned maintenance expenses. Hence, the companies relying on the break down strategy has to maintain a high maintenance cost for the machines. Moreover, Schiavone (2010) commented that the overall efficiency of the machine is also not increased rather the strategy tries to restore the machine to its previous system. Another major disadvantage of the breakdown system is the sudden shutdowns that occurs in between the long production runs which stops the production permanently thereby making damages within the revenue and supply of the products. However, Campbell et al. (2012) argued that this system ensures that the companies can avoid any maintenance planning, requires low number of staffs for the maintenance purpose and the initial maintenance costs are lower. Among the other disadvantages that the company may face due to implementation of the system is namely the workplace safety issues related to the machines, reduction in the life expectancy of the assets, high indirect costs, and higher energy costs, inefficient use of resources and mismanagement of employees work schedule.

The system is time consuming as the manager related to the system needs to produce a malfunction report, followed by a maintenance request order after which the break down maintenance may be started. The company in this regard can adopt either corrective maintenance or preventive maintenance system in order to ensure that the breakdown of the machine can be fixed with the minimum amount of cost (Zaim et al 2012).

Using the corrective maintenance system will prevent the sudden breakdowns of the machines because the company with the implementation of the corrective maintenance will be able to identify, isolate and rectify the faults within a system and restores the systems to its original operational condition with limits, which to which it can perform effectively (Su and Tsai, 2010). In his case to prevent breakdown of the machine and to reduce the maintenance costs, the company should undertake immediate corrective maintenance process so that the failure of the machine parts can be readily prevented (Ye Shen and  Xie, 2012).

In addition to the corrective maintenance, the company can also undertake the process of preventive maintenance, which will help the company to implement a maintenance strategy on a daily basis on every single price of equipment to reduce the likelihood of machine failure to zero percent (Ho and Quinino, 2012).

The Computerized Maintenance management System (CMMS) helps the organization to maintain a computer database of information about the maintenance operations of the company. This availability of the information within the system enables the maintenance workers to successfully complete their work within the scheduled time period. Thus, the workers do not miss any replacement or refurbishment of the machine parts (Verzuh, 2011). The four different functions performed by the CMMS systems within a company are namely Work orders, asset management, safety and system integration.

Work orders: The CMMS helps in scheduling jobs, assigning the maintenance project to the personnel, reservation of materials, recording of the involved costs and tracking of relevant information related to problems that are caused and the amount of wastage and downtime involved and the recommendations for the future purpose. For production of the work order for the maintenance employees the companies conduct the following processes namely inspection of the machine parts, detailed conditions of the assets, preventive maintenance procedure and repair the machine breakdown process (Wu, 2012).

Asset management: This function is undertaken in relation to the recording o the data related to the assets used by the company. The computer process gives the companies an opportunity record all the information related to the assets like the life of the asset, maintenance activities undertaken in relation to the asset, maintenance activities that are to be undertaken in the future circumstances. The asset management system also ensures that the companies are able to maintain a record database of the purchase data, warranty information, service contracts, service history, and spare parts of the machine. Thus, this record ensures that the workers get updates on the maintenance schedules and act readily without any delay in order to prevent the failure of the machine (Zou, 2012).

Safety: The detailed recordings about the machine information within the computerized database provides opportunity to the companies to identify the potentially dangerous machines and hazardous power sources in order to isolate the machines from the other machines thereby ensuring occupational health and safety issues (Nicholls, 2002).

System integration: The CMMS system uses the enterprise  software system in order to integrate the whole process stating with the scheduling of the woks, managing of the asset maintenance strategy and recording of the types of inventory and machine parts that are needed to be purchased.

Following solutions may be suggested for Krempel group with respect to the maintenance management strategies

• Firstly, storing of the information of the machines like expected life, replacement frequencies and need of maintenance parts using the CMMS system
• Secondly, the company should make calculations on the machine breakdown repair and preventive maintenance cost for each machine separately
• Thirdly, preparing of a work order data for the maintenance employees so that they may be well informed about the schedules of the maintenance projects

These solutions will help workers at Kremple to develop a more integrated working procedure and ensure the prevention of machine breakdown or shut down (Zaim et al 2012). Thus with the implementation of the CMMS techniques the company can reduce maintenance costs, increase the productivity and efficiency of the maintenance workers, ensure that the breakdown of systems are prevented and reduced. Thus, the overall productivity of the system can be enhanced and the system will ensure high productivity levels (Zou, 2012).

References

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Alaswad, S. (2012). On the maintenance modeling and optimization of repairable systems.

Applegate, L. M., Austin, R. D., and  McFarlan, F. W. (2003). Corporate information strategy and management: text and cases. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Irwin.

Campbell, J. D., Jardine, A. K., and  McGlynn, J. (Eds.). (2011). Asset management excellence: optimizing equipment life-cycle decisions. CRC Press.

Copeland, A. (2012). Is Preventive Maintenance Worth the Time, Effort, and Training?. OPF, 38(1), pp.6-7.

Costa, F. O., Takenaka‐Martinez, S., Cota, L. O. M., Ferreira, S. D., Silva, G. L. M., and Costa, J. E. (2012). Peri‐implant disease in subjects with and without preventive maintenance: a 5‐year follow‐up. Journal of clinical periodontology,39(2), 173-181.

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