As maintenance professionals, we all understand the importance of keeping equipment and assets in optimal condition to ensure smooth operations and minimize downtime. However, with limited resources and budget constraints, it can be challenging to prioritize maintenance tasks. This is where maintenance asset criticality analysis comes in.
Asset criticality analysis is a systematic approach to determine the importance of assets in a facility or organization. It involves evaluating the criticality of each asset based on its impact on operations, maintenance, safety, and financials. By identifying the most critical assets, maintenance professionals can focus their efforts and resources on maintaining them, resulting in improved overall equipment effectiveness and reduced maintenance costs.
The first step in conducting an asset criticality analysis is to keep it simple. Gather data on all the assets in your plant or facility. This includes equipment specifications, maintenance history, and operational data. Interview Operators, Front-Line Supervisors, Operations Managers, anyone that has any information on your equipment. Become Gibbs in your own ACIS - Asset Criticality Investigative Service. This information is crucial in determining the criticality of each asset. The next step is to define the criteria for evaluating the criticality of assets. Again, Keep it Simple. This can vary depending on the industry and organization, but below are the formula and factors I like to use:
Operations + Maintenance + HSE = Criticality
1. Impact on Operations: This includes the asset's role in the production process and its contribution to meeting production targets. Assets that are essential for production or have a high impact on production output are considered more critical. One way that is helpful is to get an understanding of product flow through your plant. This allows you to identify current bottlenecks and Single Points of Failure in your production lines. All SPOF should be considered at the highest criticality level. A deeper look into the revenue side of downtime can also assist in setting up your criticality for equipment. By knowing what the Cost of Downtime (by Hour) is for each piece of equipment, you can better justify the need for critical spares for high criticality equipment.
2. Impact on Maintenance: Assets that have a high failure frequency coupled with a long repair lead time (MTTR) either due to parts or work and have a significant impact on the organization's finances are considered critical. This includes assets that have a high maintenance cost or those that, if failed, would result in significant financial losses.
3. Safety: The safety of employees and the environment is a top priority for any organization. Assets that pose a safety risk or have a high potential for causing accidents are deemed critical.
Once the criteria are defined, each asset is evaluated and assigned a criticality ranking. This ranking can be numerical, such as a scale of 1 to4, or color-coded, with red indicating the most critical and green the least critical. The criticality ranking can also be used to prioritize maintenance tasks, with the most critical assets receiving the highest priority. Remember, this does not have to be over-complicated, keep it simple. Complexity can kill the effort.
Simple Criticality Matrix
Maintenance asset criticality analysis is an ongoing process and should be reviewed regularly to ensure its accuracy. As assets age or production processes change, their criticality may also change, requiring a reassessment of their ranking. It is also essential to involve all stakeholders, including maintenance technicians, operators, and management, in the analysis to get a comprehensive understanding of the assets' criticality.
The benefits of conducting an asset criticality analysis are numerous. By focusing on the most critical assets, maintenance professionals can optimize their resources and efforts, resulting in improved equipment reliability and reduced downtime. It also helps in making informed decisions about maintenance strategies, such as preventive maintenance, predictive maintenance, or run-to-failure, based on the criticality of assets.
In conclusion, asset criticality analysis is a valuable tool for maintenance professionals to prioritize their tasks and allocate resources effectively. By understanding the criticality of assets, organizations can improve their maintenance practices, leading to increased productivity, safety, and cost savings. I highly recommend conducting a maintenance asset criticality analysis to any organization looking to improve their maintenance processes and achieve operational excellence.
Thanks for reading.
Until Next Time....
Let's Get Back to Basics.
Chris
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