Machine criticality based maintenance prioritization: Identifying productivity improvement potential
Journal article, 2018

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to identify the productivity improvement potentials from maintenance planning practices in manufacturing companies. In particular, the paper aims at understanding the connection between machine criticality assessment and maintenance prioritization in industrial practice, as well as providing the improvement potentials. Design/methodology/approach – An explanatory mixed method research design was used in this study. Data from literature analysis, a web-based questionnaire survey, and semi-structured interviews were gathered and triangulated. Additionally, simulation experimentation was used to evaluate the productivity potential.
Findings – The connection between machine criticality and maintenance prioritization is assessed in an industrial set-up. The empirical findings show that maintenance prioritization is not based on machine criticality, as criticality assessment is non-factual, static, and lacks system view. It is with respect to these finding that the ways to increase system productivity and future directions are charted.
Originality/value – In addition to the empirical results showing productivity improvement potentials, the paper emphasizes on the need for a systems view for solving maintenance problems, i.e. solving maintenance problems for the whole factory. This contribution is equally important for both industry and academics, as the maintenance organization needs to solve this problem with the help of the right decision support.

Maintenance

Productivity

Decision support systems

Machine criticality

Maintenance prioritization

Author

Maheshwaran Gopalakrishnan

Chalmers, Industrial and Materials Science, Production Systems

Anders Skoogh

Chalmers, Industrial and Materials Science, Production Systems

International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management

1741-0401 (ISSN)

Vol. 67 4 654-672

Subject Categories

Production Engineering, Human Work Science and Ergonomics

Reliability and Maintenance

Areas of Advance

Production

DOI

10.1108/IJPPM-07-2017-0168

More information

Latest update

10/23/2022