RELIABILITY CENTRED MAINTENANCE

MAINTENANCE:
Ensuring that physical assets (equipment / machinery) continue to fulfill their
intended functions.

RCM:
Process used to determine maintenance requirements of physical asset
(equipment / machinery) in the factory.

RCM looks at:

 Failure modes
 Failure effects
 Failure consequences
 Hidden failures (consequences)
 Safety & environmental consequences
 Operational consequences

Procedure used:

 What are the functions and associated performance standards of the asset
in its present operating context?
 In what ways does it fail to fulfill its functions?
 What causes each functional failure?
 What happens when each functional failure occurs?
 In what way does each failure matter?
 What can be done to prevent each failure?
 What if a suitable preventative task cannot be found?
RCM REVIEW GROUPS
 Facilitator - the most important person. His / her role is to:
 Ask a structured series of questions
 Ensure that the group achieves consensus
 Record the answers on RCM worksheets
 Production supervisor
 Maintenance supervisor
 Operator
 Artisan/Maintenance Fitter/Maintenance Technician
 External specialist

They focuses primarily on assets and processes, with less emphasis on

people.

Disadvantage
Does not secure long-term involvement and commitment of all the people in the
organization

Advantage
It is quick and easy to manage because only few people are involved

WHAT RCM ACHIEVES

Outcomes of an RCM analysis:
 Learning about functions
 A better understanding of how the asset can fail and of the root causes of
each failure
 Lists of proposed tasks

The benefits of RCM

 Greater safety and environmental integrity
 Improved operating performance
 Greater maintenance cost-effectiveness
 Longer useful life of expensive items