Chapter 9 - Maintenance Practices

Abstract

This chapter discusses various aspects of maintenance practices at Beta International. The company understands that the comprehensive application of preventive, predictive, and proactive maintenance practices in an integrated philosophy, integrated with operations, engineering, purchasing, and stores practices, is essential to its success. Application of best practices is the key to the success of each of its manufacturing plants, particularly as it relates to effective application of supply chain and lean manufacturing principles. The company has found that it could substantially improve on its current level of performance by learning what the best plants were achieving and how all its plants compared, emulating how those best plants were achieving superior results, and by adding a measure of common sense and management skill., Perhaps in the long term, it could even exceed the current benchmarks. The company is using the knowledge of the maintenance function to ensure that it designs, buys, stores, operates, and maintains its plants for maximum reliability and uptime. It is found that uptime and overall equipment effectiveness are improving dramatically, resulting in increased production, better asset utilization, higher profit, and, eventually, world-class performance at Beta plants.