From
the maintenance perspective, the benefits included the
following:
1. More frequent access to the
machine to care for deteriorating parts saving
material costs and maintenance time needed to correct
major failures. An increase in pride and ownership
would come from better equipment uptime.
2. More tasks could be completed
by key mechanics, leading to less negotiating with
other departments for resources. In turn, getting
additional resources would be far easier because of
the reduced need for them.
3. The quality of life should be
improved by having more manageable schedules. Weekends
would be available for employees to enjoy with
families.
4. More frequent access to the
machine would lead to more proactive, predictive
maintenance.
5. Focusing on fewer tasks at
shutdown events would provide higher attention to
detail and fewer mistakes. More work would be
completed correctly the first time.
6. This approach would level out
the maintenance workload over the year, smoothing the
growth of technology and process improvements. Key
mechanics could train at a less intense pace.
7. The maintenance budget would
reduce demonstrating maintenance effectiveness and a
step toward world-class.
Once this plan was communicated,
both production and maintenance readily agreed to
accept a six-month trial period. As the trial began,
everyone was optimistic that the expected benefits
would be evident soon. The transition to the new
system was, in fact, smooth. The early results also
shaped modifications to the plan.
A number of additional benefits
immediately surfaced. With more focus on fewer tasks,
along with more advance work on parts and tools, the
estimates for shutdown and maintenance linestop work
could be reduced significantly. The combination of
fixed startups and better leverage of the key
mechanics with clear priority lists (avoiding
multi-tasking) enabled many jobs to progress ahead of
schedule. With the shorter shut-downs, the energy
level was maintained. The amount of work completed
daily was impressive. The overall experience indicated
that the historical requirement of 16,000 hours of
work was now overstated. A new target was established
of about 11,000 hours. A reduction of work of 5,000
hours.
