Page 74 - Facility Management (All Chapter)

TOTAL PRODUCTIVE MAINTENANCE

7.1 INTRODUCTION TO TPM

TPM means Total Productive Maintenance. TPM is an equipment management
program that involves all employees in the organisation in the maintenance and
repair of the organisation assets, whether a facility or plant. This definition is a
departure from the past practice of each part of a company having a definite
role to play with certain borders. For example, the common situation is where
the operations or production department runs the equipment and the
maintenance department maintains the equipment. If the equipment begins to
develop a problem, the operator would call the maintenance department. The
maintenance department would respond, based on its current workload and
severity of the problem the operator had identified.

If the maintenance department was working on other critical problems, and the
problem the operator called is was small, it may have been a considerable time
before anyone was sent to correct the problem. During this time, the problem
would have grown, and either a breakdown would have occurred, or the
equipment condition would have deteriorated to the point that damage had
been done to the equipment or the product. In either case, additional costs were
incurred.

If the equipment experienced a breakdown, then there would have been the
cost of lost production, or the lost use of a portion of the facility. In addition, the
cost of the maintenance action would have been increased, since equipment
breakdowns are always more expensive than equipment servicing. Even if a
breakdown did not occur, chances are the equipment condition would have
deteriorated to a point where the quality of the product (or service) was affected.
This would result in an increased quality cost. These increased costs make the
company less competitive with its competitors (whether foreign or domestic).

7.2 FIVE PILLARS OF TPM

TPM refers to small group activities calling for total employee involvement and
implemented primarily by the production, maintenance, and plant engineering
departments to maximize productivity. In short, it is a strategy to realize Zero
Accidents, Zero Defects, and Zero Breakdowns. TPM implementation must
take into account the conditions that exist in each company or factory, such as
plant configuration, organisation, local history, and culture at the plant site. TPM
consists of the following major activities as shown in Table 7.1.

TPM is not an end in itself and it is not a one-time process. The discipline of
TPM has to be instilled in each and every employee and the improvement
through TPM is a continuous process. What does TPM achieve?

BPLK 74 DMQ 40392