Autonomous Maintenance: The Key to a Healthy TPM Program

The word “autonomous” is commonly associated with “automatic,” a word that instantly brings AGVs to mind. However, when referring to maintenance work, we want you to think of the word “autonomous” in terms of Merriam-Webster’s definition: “undertaken or carried on without outside control.”

The primary goal of autonomous maintenance is to divvy out the more simpler maintenance tasks to machine operators. By using this self-management technique that requires operators to take charge of their own machines, professional maintenance technicians have more time to take care of higher priority maintenance work. Overall, this strategy leads to a more productive workplace and more reliable equipment.

Autonomous Maintenance & Total Productive Maintenance

There are eight pillars that make up Total Productive Maintenance:

1. Autonomous Maintenance
2. Focused Improvement
3. Preventative Maintenance
4. Early Management of New Equipment
5. Process Quality Management
6. Administrative Work
7. Education and Training
8. Safety, Health, and the Environment

All eight pillars work with the intention of reaching three goals: no machine breakdowns, no product defects, and no workplace accidents. While those three goals work to improve a workplace in terms of productivity, TPM also inadvertently addresses the amount of waste present in the facility. With that being said, this Lean manufacturing strategy can be one of the most difficult to implement due to its need for facility-wide involvement.

Notice that autonomous maintenance is at the very beginning of this Lean manufacturing strategy. The shifting of responsibilities from maintenance technicians to operators when it comes to basic problem solving, cleaning, and inspection tasks is the starting point for an excellent TPM program. Once that occurs, the other puzzle pieces fall into place and eventually lead to accomplishing the goals that TPM initially sets for its users.

Autonomous Maintenance vs. Preventative Maintenance

Autonomous maintenance and preventative maintenance, while both under the same umbrella of Total Productive Maintenance, have differing goals and qualities when it comes to equipment upkeep. The simple explanation is that autonomous maintenance is geared towards operators maintaining basic needs for the equipment they run whereas preventative maintenance is geared towards scheduled inspections.

Let’s go into more depth. There are two core principles to autonomous maintenance: preventing equipment deterioration through proper operation and maintaining “like new” conditions with proper management practices. Those responsibilities are placed on the operator’s shoulders as they are the ones who must perform basic maintenance on their machine.

As for preventative maintenance, the core principle here is to prevent downtime through regular inspections. That goal is achieved by taking care of the equipment in a way that promotes longevity, reducing critical machine breakdowns, and lastly minimizing production loss stemmed from equipment failure. Preventative maintenance is unique in that there are two other categories that fall within this maintenance strategy: usage-based maintenance and prescriptive maintenance.

Overall, both autonomous and preventative maintenance are incredibly important for the longevity and success of a TPM program. As two of the eight pillars that hold up TPM efforts, both types of maintenance account for a significant portion of duties within the house of TPM.

What is Overall Equipment Effectiveness?

The point of calculating OEE is to measure the total percentage of productivity occurring in a facility. The calculation effort assists facilities in identifying improvement opportunities and revealing losses that may have been previously hidden in the manufacturing process.

There are three parts needed to calculate the OEE of a process:

1. Availability – Calculate this data by dividing run time and the planned production time.
2. Productivity – Calculate this data by multiplying the deal cycle time and the total count and then dividing that result by the actual run time.
3. Quality – Calculate this data by dividing the good count by the total count

Each answer to these equations will result in a percentage, 100% being the goal for every answer. Of course, a perfect 100% is virtually impossible, but getting as close as you can to that number is an excellent goal.

Calculating Overall Equipment Effectiveness is considered to be a best practice method for manufacturing since it’s considered an essential component to Total Productive Maintenance. To help you with those calculations, Creative Safety Supply has made a calculator for OEE! Try it out for yourself here.

The 7 Steps of Autonomous Maintenance

Autonomous maintenance doesn’t just happen on its own. There are rules to follow and objectives to uphold within this type of maintenance strategy. Again, autonomous maintenance can be incredibly difficult to follow and sustain. In fact, it’s common knowledge that those who try to implement this maintenance effort only make it to step three before the strategy falls apart.

Become familiar with what it takes to set up an autonomous maintenance program before diving in! Not only will it increase your chance of correctly implementing the maintenance program, but it will also play a part in your ability to keep it going.

Take a look at the following seven steps that are integral to the success of a fully-fledged autonomous maintenance program:

1. Train theperators – The best time to train an operator on autonomous maintenance is before they need to perform small maintenance tasks on their machine. Receiving training from the company’s maintenance technicians on the machine’s compone Onts, how they work, and the necessary problem-solving skills is critical to get started with autonomous maintenance. With that being said, operators must learn how to:

• Notice abnormalities
• Correct those abnormalities
• Set the optimum equipment conditions
• Maintain those optimal conditions

Getting Your Maintenance Department to go Lean

When we refer to waste, it’s not just the trash you put into waste bins. Instead, it’s time, labor, inventory, and energy. Wasteful behavior is a direct result of how the facility has chosen to operate, whether that be intentionally or from a lack of understanding.

It can be argued that Lean maintenance is a prerequisite to Lean manufacturing because success begins with maintaining physical assets. Lean maintenance is defined as the application of Lean management tools to physical asset management. Keeping your tools in working order results in higher productivity, reduced costs, and naturally calls for the incorporation of Total Productive Maintenance to keep maintenance standards met.

Lean Tools and Techniques for Successful Autonomous Maintenance Programs

Some of the Lean tools a company can use to support their growing autonomous maintenance efforts include:

The Benefits of Autonomous Maintenance

Despite how difficult autonomous maintenance is to implement in its entirely, it’s a wonderful addition to any maintenance program. Not only does it free up time for more important maintenance tasks, but it also increases the longevity of your equipment with minimal effort put forth by the operators themselves.

The following is a list of only a handful of benefits that this kind of maintenance program has to offer. Perhaps they will convince you to try out an autonomous maintenance program yourself!

In the end, autonomous maintenance plays an important part in the Total Productive Maintenance System since reducing waste begins with actually taking care of equipment.