
In a production or manufacturing environment, maintenance is necessary for smooth and safe daily plant operations. Maintenance engineers not only monitor the existing systems and equipment, they also recommend improved systems and help decide when systems are outdated and in need of replacement. Good maintenance engineering is vital to the success of any manufacturing or processing operation, regardless of its size.

Currently, Dr. Ntokozo Mthembu (Advisor to the ODI Board) is doing an online course in Introduction to Maintenance Engineering offered by Lulea University of Technology, Sweden, through the FutureLearn educational online channel. The course leader is Professor Uday Kumar.
Ntokozo writes:
“I am honoured and pleased to share the insights on engineering maintenance with the ODI community of 20 Keys implementers. My wish is that these insights shared herein will equip, empower and enable the ODI 20 Keys implementers to draw their application on the canvas of their understanding.
I am planning to present a couple of series, starting with 3 concepts out of 6 maintenance engineering concepts of Professor Kumar.“

Series 1: Why, What and When
During my initial studies in World Class Manufacturing in the early 1990s, I came across problem-solving techniques such 5WHYs and the 5W1H. I didn’t know that 3 decades later, I would encounter another form of 5W1H again, but not just for problem-solving maintenance problems, but for giving contextual understanding of what I did 30 years ago! There is a South African saying in most of our 11 languages that translates into “umuntu ufunda aze afe” meaning in Georgian language (after Kings ‘George Xs’ of England) “one never ceases to learn until swallowed by the grave.”
Professor Kumar describes the first 3 W’s of maintenance: Why, What and When?
WHY MAINTENANCE?
Maintenance failures bring about inconvenience to customers, accidents and significant losses. Failure is the termination of the ability to perform a required function. Fundamentally, it increases to the process, and it is integral process of business.

WHY SHOULD WE LEARN ABOUT MAINTENANCE?
There are 3 reasons namely to
- increase safety,
- reduce costs and
- improve the sustainability.
The main values for engaging ion maintenance are to:
- improve economic performance of the system,
- improve the quality,
- increase safety/health and
- increase overall lifespan of the systems.
The overall purpose is to reduce business risk.

Kumar lists the following as the influencing factors:
- unreliability,
- human errors,
- loss of quality,
- loss of production and
- upset customers

WHAT IS MAINTENANCE?
There are 3 elements of maintenance:
1 engineering,
2 technology, and
3 management
WHEN?
Maintenance is required in all phases of the product, which are design, procurement, installation, commissioning and operation.
3.1 Design state:
Design state comprises two phases namely design-out maintenance, and design for maintenance. Both phases are the competence of designers, who should be open minded to work with a multi-disciplinary team comprising of engineers, operators and managers of various operations along the product value chain. Certainly, not designing in isolation, based on reading design specifications devoid of human context and interaction with users.
Design-out maintenance (DOM) objective is to try and reduce the need for maintenance. Examples for this type of maintenance regime include spacecrafts/ships and satellites orbiting the earth. According to Reliability Management Consultant (Pty) Ltd (RMCPL), the aim for DOM is to improve:
- equipment availability by extending the mean free operating life (MFOL)
- production capacity by minimising unplanned downtime
- safety by eliminating the consequences of failures and reducing failure rates.
- extend the total life of an equipment by using the equipment for maximum possible years
- life cycle costs (LCC) by minimising maintenance costs
- sustainability through optimised use of resources to run the system at the best operating condition.

Design for maintenance incorporates standardisation, modularisation, redundancy, provision for condition monitoring, and design of maintenance facilities and tools. NASA dedicates a full chapter under Man-Systems Integration Standards, and we shall touch on design considerations, looking at factors of design for maintainability (DfM). The factors include:
- non-interference of preventive maintenance, where the preventive maintenance is minimised and requires as little crew as possible
- flexible preventive maintenance schedule, where preventive maintenance schedule should be flexible to accommodate schedule of other mission activities. In the production environment parlance, accommodate customer demands
- redundancy, whereby if maintenance is necessary and the system operations will be interrupted, redundant installations should be considered in order to permit maintenance without system operation. In the manufacturing and production environment, equipment such as pumps, valves and even critical gearboxes should be considered for redundancy.
- design for maintainability, that include the following goals
- reducing training requirements of crew (artisans / operators)
- reducing certain skill requirements of crew
- reduce time spent on preventive and corrective maintenance
- corrective maintenance, which include the following factors : (1)The benefit gained from repair should be worth the time and effort expended on repair. (2) The time and effort involved in corrective maintenance should be weighed against the cost and feasibility of carrying replacement units. (3) Required calibration, alignment, or adjustment should be easily and accurately accomplished, and (4) Automate fault detection and isolation tasks whenever possible.

3.2 Procurement state
Procurement deals with selecting the good quality and reliability of components through contract and maintenance management, dimensioning of existing facilities and organisation, and purchase of specific parts needed.
3.3 Operation state
In manufacturing and production plants, procurement is often tied up with its three sisters (certainly not the Three Sisters of Victoria West, Northern Cape, South Africa), namely maintenance, repair and operations (MRO). Ganeriwalla and Valluru (2016) list five advantages for capturing the MRO in manufacturing: –
1 Better planning, to improve spare part planning
2 More suppliers, to reduce proprietary spending
3 Fewer long-tail vendors, to consolidate spending with aggregators
4 Cheaper sources, to source from LCC (Low-cost country) suppliers
5 More efficient stocking, to optimise inventory management and storage

Operation is concerned about design of technical activities incorporating design of maintenance intervals, specific resources and managerial activities such as budget allocation and personnel.
3.4 Installation and Commissioning states
Both states require a paradigm shift in which to strive to install the product or system in a place where minimal maintenance is performed, considering logistics, monitoring systems and personnel training.
In installation, Blueprint Automation recommends about 10 steps to consider when installing an equipment:
- Determine the floor thickness
- Find out about environmental conditions
- Gather the necessary supplies (requisite tools)
- Drop site of the equipment (not entrance but at the place where it is supposed to be installed)
- Check piping and surrounding items
- Ensure the floor is aligned
- Consider storage options (to mitigate Murphy’s law)
- Schedule safety courses (OEM or supplier must provide safety training – not accept training manuals without OEM/supplier guidance)
- Schedule a follow-up visits after installation (insist on such a visit if you are an equipment buyer)
In commissioning, Paul Turner of the Commissioning Academy, list seven (7) steps for commissioning a factory equipment, namely
1 Planning
2 Factory Acceptance Testing
3 Mechanical completion
4 On-site commissioning
5 Process / System set up
6 Performance verification, and
7 Operational readiness
Keep an eye out for the upcoming articles by Dr Dr. Ntokozo Mthembu (Advisor to the ODI Board) regarding The Kumar’s Why, What, When, How, Who and Where Concepts of Engineering Maintenance.
Johan Benadie (Director at ODI asked the question: “How far do we keep machines and equipment in service?”. To read this article by Johan, click here.
ODI has been in business since 1989. It has successfully implemented the 20 Keys, and supporting programmes in a large number of companies, in a wide variety of industries, and across the world. To contact us, click here.
To be continued