OPTIMIZING YOUR

MAINTENANCE STRATEGY
IN LESS TIME
Authored by Allen Garcia, CMRP
Reliability Engineer
ARMS Reliability

www.armsreliability.com
INTRODUCTION
Companies gain a competitive advantage by Accessibility of that information is the next
implementing optimized maintenance strategies consideration. Even if you have the optimum
for their capital assets, thereby maximizing the maintenance strategy in place, it won’t be
return on investment. effective unless it’s easily accessible and visible
to users and management.
Creating optimized maintenance strategies
is not a one-and-done effort but a continual Wouldn’t it be ideal if with one click all your team
improvement process that must take into members could view a summary of the strategy
account changing business needs, new being performed on an asset? What if they could
inspection technologies, and empirical data from not only view the strategy but adapt it to their
completed work orders. This activity can be own particular application in a different plant?
daunting, especially when the number of assets
This paper will explore how to use an enterprise
in your CMMS is in the thousands.
reliability software solution to create an overall
To make this process less intimidating, start asset management strategy that is responsive
creating your maintenance strategy with the end to the ever-changing realities of your company’s
in mind – what content will be contained within specific assets and is easily shared between all
the CMMS and executed by the maintenance stakeholders.
personnel.

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TRADITIONAL GENERIC
MAINTENANCE VS NEW PARADIGM

We’re going to look at how best to apply generic According to Moubray’s maxim 11, “generic
strategies across multiple assets, but first let’s policies should only be applied to identical
examine how generic maintenance strategies assets whose operating context, functions, and
have traditionally been applied in the past. desired standards of performance are also
identical.” 2
Current industrial asset strategies are almost
always based on either the wrong information By contrast, the common way of doing things
or incomplete information, including “gut feel,” assigns a generic maintenance strategy that
expert judgment, and the blind use of original assumes the approach to one asset type is
equipment manufacturer (OEM) maintenance mostly true across all asset types. The missing
manuals. piece here? The asset’s operating context.

Not much has changed since 1973 when To combat these missteps, begin by assigning
A.K.S. Jardine wrote that “…many preventative generic strategies, but subsequently perform
maintenance schemes are put into operation variations to accommodate the physical asset’s
with only a slight, if any, quantitative approach to operating context.
the scheme.” 1

For instance, very little evidence exists to

support the task frequencies that were chosen
in the past, but those strategies continue to be
applied today.

Another example of building a foundation on the

wrong information is an asset strategy based on
production schedules and geographical plant
layout rather than actual equipment reliability
requirements. Under this scenario, it is no
wonder that maintenance personnel would have
little ownership over the asset strategy. This may
be part of the reason why asset strategies have
remained stagnant.

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METHODOLOGY

Contrary to traditional RCM studies where each

asset is evaluated and a strategy developed, Real Life Example
building generic strategies then subsequently One Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) facility
concluded that it would take 90 days using a
adjusting according to the asset’s operational
traditional RCM approach to develop an optimum
context is a much more efficient process. maintenance strategy. Using the methodology
discussed here instead, they developed optimum
It is important to note that this methodology
maintenance strategies for 3,650 assets based
can be applied to virtually all industries where a on 122 unique equipment classes in half the time.
maintenance program is required.

FIGURE # 1 PROCESS FLOW STRATEGY RAPID DEPLOYMENT

Before building generic strategies, you must Nomenclature is also important when defining
define your equipment classes. These can equipment classes, as these terms will later be
include categories such as: pumps, motors, applied to specific assets. A good practice is
transmitters, switches, breakers, etc. to abbreviate classes into four characters, e.g.
Sometimes it is ideal to break out equipment the ID for a pump can be PUGN, specifying
classes beyond just basic equipment types. it is a general (GN) pump (PU). Note that the
Equipment classes could be further broken abbreviation of PUMP was not used here as
down into size, such as small motor (e.g. <50HP), there are several types of pumps (hydraulic,
medium motor (e.g. 50-150HP), and large motor diaphragm, submersible, etc.). This practice
(e.g. >150HP). should be considered for all other equipment
classes.
Creating generic strategies raises the question:
how generic is generic? For this methodology, a
generic strategy is defined by maintenance that
is common amongst that particular equipment
class. For example, when it comes to motors,
generic strategies would include tasks such as
lubrication and vibration analysis tasks.

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 FIGURE # 2 GENERIC STRATEGY FMEA EXAMPLE

Once the generic strategies have been built, There is no universal ratio of equipment classes
the next step is to define the asset hierarchy. to assets, just bear in mind the multiplicity
Each organization should establish a hierarchy factor your equipment classes could have. For
that reflects the different areas of the plant. example, let’s say an equipment class for a
Depending on the CMMS, these locations have pump can be multiplied across 10 assets in the
a different nomenclature. For example, for plant, whereas a transmitter can be multiplied
SAP the hierarchy locations are the Functional times 1,000 asset tags in the plant. This thought
Locations (FLOC). process can help guide you when it comes to
defining the equipment classes.

Real Life Example

In the case of the LNG facility, it had 3,650 assets
broken up into a hierarchy of six levels.

Figures 2, 3, and 4 are images from Isograph’s Availability Workbench™.

ARMS Reliability is an authorized distributor of Isograph’s products, and a trainer in respect of their use.

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 FIGURE # 3 FUNCTIONAL HIERARCHY EXAMPLE

In Figure 4, we used the enterprise solution tool to link the equipment classes to their corresponding
assets. All the data that was contained in the generic strategy (equipment class), including functions,
functional failures, failure modes, failure and repair data, are now assigned to the physical asset.

FIGURE # 4 LINK OF GENERIC STRATEGY TO PHYSICAL ASSET

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After the generic strategies are deployed to their corresponding physical assets, the next step
is to generate variations on the maintenance strategies. This means that failure and repair data
previously established in the generic strategy can be modified to reflect the physical asset’s
operating context.

In addition to varying failure and repair data, other data such as functions, functional failures, failure
modes, and consequences can be modified. It is important to keep track of what was changed and,
sometimes, who has changed it. The centralized database then becomes a great tool for change
management, as it can notify the user about variations that are made on their strategies. Moreover,
there is now a sense of governance of the maintenance strategy from inception to implementation,
with the maintenance and reliability program becoming increasingly more collaborative.

Lastly, tasks are packaged to facilitate planning and scheduling. At this stage, planners are involved
to unify the strategy, most typically, by frequency and trade. Most strategy development exercises
live and die within the reliability/maintenance team, not often involving planners and schedulers.
By broadening the borders of these teams, maintenance planning becomes a part of the reliability
framework. This stage can help alleviate data migration pains, as an enterprise solution can
integrate directly with any particular CMMS. Having a link between the enterprise solution and the
CMMS bridges the common gap between reliability analysis and implementation.

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 FIGURE # 5 TASK PACKAGING EXAMPLE

As with any scientific method approach, we An enterprise solution eases process

identify and track continuous improvement by improvement and makes everything more
what we can measure. Work orders will provide visible to stakeholders. It allows management to
feedback on the maintenance strategy to help measure progress on strategy development in
determine whether it is indeed optimum or if it real time, and allows them to act as gatekeepers,
still needs modification. authorizing changes that might affect different
areas across the organization.

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CONCLUSION

At the beginning of this paper, it was stated

Real Life Example
that the way to create an effective strategy
An LNG facility plagued by missing and outdated
is with the end goal in mind. Not only have maintenance strategies across 3,650 assets
we met our goal by equipping the end user was able to leverage generic strategies for
122 equipment types in just 44 days. They now
with an optimal strategy, but along the way
have a path to further optimize and adapt these
we created a company-wide set of strategies strategies going forward, saving a great deal of
that is housed in one central location, readily time and money.
available for use and continuous improvement.

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REFERENCES
[1] J ardine, A.K.S. (1973). Maintenance, replacement and reliability. Pitman. London.
[2] Moubray, John M. “Maintenance Management: A New Paradigm”. Aladon Ltd, UK, pp.7 – 11, 2000.
[Online] Available: http://www.maintenanceresources.com/RCM/Maintparadigm, July 12, 2016.

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