Uptime Magazine - October/November 2008 - (Page 61)

Banking management, without an in-depth understanding of their mortgage underwriting vulnerabilities, were totally oblivious to the real risks involved. In the Reliability World: Senior Plant and Facilities management, without an in-depth understanding of their real plant vulnerabilities, are also oblivious to the real risks they are taking. THE PROFIT MOTIVE TRUMPED EVERYTHING ELSE: In the Financial World: The investment banks on Wall Street were too busy making money to perform a “self-assessment” of their true vulnerabilities. In the Reliability World: Plant management is often so focused on reducing costs and saving money that they become unmindful of the true vulnerabilities in their plant. THE ADDITION OF COMPLEXITY AND CONFUSION CAMOUFLAGED THE RISKS: In the Financial World: The mortgage documents were so complicated that the people in China, Japan, Europe and even here in the USA had no idea of the “exposure to danger” that they were investing in. In the Reliability World: The PM program becomes so convoluted that it camouflages the real “exposure to catastrophe” in ones plant. COVERED THEIR EYES TO REALITY: In the Financial World: They inadvertently put on a set of blinders to prevent seeing the deficiencies that existed in their mortgage lending program. In the Reliability World: They may inadvertently put on a set of blinders to prevent seeing the deficiencies existing in their preventive maintenance program. If your plant management team’s primary goal is to “keep things humming along” and only pay lip-service to preventive maintenance, then disaster is right around the corner. While it may not happen on their watch, especially if they are close to retirement, it could quite possibly happen on your watch. Was there ever a doubt that a “day of reckoning” was going to happen in the financial world with so many billions of dollars being lent to people, many of which had no job and offered bogus applications to substantiate their income? Was there any doubt that home prices could not continue to skyrocket 15% to 20%, year over year over year? Likewise, was there ever a doubt that a “day of reckoning” was going to happen and cause the hundreds of plant shutdowns, fires, explosions, and fatalities that have occurred due to equipment problems whereby a less than robust preventive maintenance program was in place? Is there any doubt that unanalyzed or incorrectly analyzed failure modes or hidden failures in standby, backup, and redundant systems are just waiting to wreak havoc on our plants or facilities? Is there any doubt that this situation exists, and just might happen at your plant or facility? If so, it doesn’t have to be that way. Different reliability professionals and different corporate organizations will no doubt be at different levels of understanding and different levels of implementation in their quest for achieving reliability. A large number of you are just beginning to realize and understand that the unknown and unanalyzed consequences of failure pose the most serious threat to the safety and reliability of your plant, and to the well-being of your plant personnel. There is a new wave that is bringing classical RCM back to its simple original roots like it was always intended to be. Many astute Maintenance and Reliability professionals have already begun to realize the benefits of riding this new wave, and let’s hope that many more will ride the wave to reliability success. Neil Bloom is the author of “Reliability Centered Maintenance – Implementation Made Simple” published by McGraw-Hill. He is a mechanical engineer with over 35 years of both hands-on and senior level engineering and maintenance management experience in RCM and Preventive Maintenance Programs in the commercial aviation and commercial nuclear power industries. He is an international guest speaker on RCM and an Instructor of RCM in the Continuing Education Division at the University of California-Irvine (UCI). Neil provides 3-day RCM Training Seminars/Workshops and can be reached at neilbloom@RCMAuthor. com or (949) 218-1286. His website is www. rcmtrainingseminars.com. References 1. RCM – Implementation Made Simple, Bloom, Neil B., McGraw-Hill Professional (2006) Best efforts without knowledge are just best efforts. - W Edward Deming How will you improve asset utilization? How will you improve capacity? How will you gain reliability? Find 24 Focused Reliability Knowledge Bases at www.reliabilityweb.com www.uptimemagazine.com 57 http://www.reliabilityweb.com http://www.reliabilityweb.com http://www.rcmtrainingseminars.com http://www.rcmtrainingseminars.com http://www.uptimemagazine.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Uptime Magazine - October/November 2008

Uptime Magazine - October/November 2008 Contents Upfront Upclose: An Asset Management Oasis in the Desert Information Technology: Streamlining Through Simplicity Lubrication: Phases for Framing a Solid Foundation Infrared: Do Your Homework Before You Buy Maintenance Management: Get It Together by Getting Together Motor Testing: Key Elements in Motor Decision Making Precision Maintenance: Shedding Some Light on Tolerances Reliability: RCM & the Mortgage Meltdown Ultrasound: A Multidimensional Tool Vibration: The Whirling Pump Mystery, Solved with ODS Upgrade: Are You Looking in the Right Place for Your Wear Debris?

Uptime Magazine - October/November 2008

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