MAINTENANCE

Engr. Prof. L. O. Adekoya

Department of Mechanical Engineering
Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife

INTRODUCTION

Maintenance is the upkeep of facilities and equipment. Upkeep means the restoration to,
or keeping in, a specified operating condition. There are many reasons why facilities and
equipment must be maintained. The major objectives of maintenance include the
following:
(i) To extend the useful life of the system. This is particularly important in
developing countries where there is a scarcity of capital funds for replacement.
(ii) To assure the optimum availability of the system for service or production and
obtain maximum possible return on investment.
(iii) To ensure the safety of personnel using the facility or equipment.

Many terms are used in discussing maintenance. Some of them are:

Breakdown: An unexpected change in duty status from operational to non-operational,

due to (mechanical or electrical) failure.

Consumables: Materials used up during an equipment’s operation, as are fuel and engine
oil in a car.

Failure: Inability to perform the basic function, or to perform it within specified limits;
malfunction.

Installation: (1) A fixed or relatively fixed facility location together with its real estate,
buildings, structures, utilities, and equipment. (2) That period of initial setup,
adjustment and checkout of a product in the customer’s environment.

Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF): The average time/distance/events a product

delivers between breakdowns.

Spares: Components, assemblies, and equipment that are completely interchangeable

with like items and can be used to replace items removed during maintenance.

Troubleshooting: Locating or isolating and identifying discrepancies or malfunctions of

an equipment and determining the corrective action required.

For other terms and their definitions, please see the Appendix.

Types of Maintenance
Maintenance can be divided into three major types: improvement maintenance, corrective
maintenance and preventive maintenance (See Figure 1).

Improvement Maintenance
These are modifications, retrofits or redesigns for (or in order to achieve) better
maintenance. The objective is the same as that of reliability, that is, to reduce, or even
1
 eliminate the need for maintenance. For example, air flow can be diverted so that
components are more adequately cooled and (therefore) subjected to less environmental
contamination or overheating. Either of these results in less frequent maintenance.

Corrective Maintenance
These are operations carried out to restore a machine to operative condition after a
breakdown, accident, wear, etc. Since these activities are generally not known in
advance, and therefore cannot be scheduled, they are often referred to as unscheduled,
emergency or repair maintenance.

Preventive Maintenance
These are actions performed in an attempt to keep a machine in a specified operating
condition, by means of systematic inspection, detection and prevention of incipient
failures.

Preventive maintenance is advantageous because it prevents failure at very inopportune

times, injury to personnel, and costs less than repair. On the other hand, many
organizations do far too much scheduled maintenance and thereby induce problems and
incur excessively high costs.

Preventive maintenance could be subdivided into Periodic and Predictive Maintenance.

These sub-groups can be further subdivided into Routine and Scheduled Maintenance and
Condition Monitor (or Condition Monitoring) and On-Condition Maintenance
respectively.

Maintenance

Improvement Preventive Corrective

Periodic Predictive

Routine Scheduled Condition Monitor On-Condition

(Condition Monitoring)

Figure1: Types of Maintenance

2
Periodic Preventive Maintenance

i. Routine Preventive Maintenance

These are maintenance operations, not involving disassembly or replacement of
components and comprising mainly of cleaning and adjustments, that are carried out
regularly such as every hour or everyday or every week.

ii. Scheduled Maintenance

This is maintenance in which preventive activities are scheduled for fixed intervals that
are much longer than routine intervals. Moreover these activities include oiling, greasing,
adjustments, replacement of parts, etc. This type of maintenance may be due to
government regulations, scheduling of downtime around production operations,
availability of special personnel or simply the need for a finite standard that can be
understood by everyone involved e.g. oil changes.

There are advantages in scheduling a fixed time for preventive maintenance. All the
necessary personnel, parts, tools, and information may be scheduled and made available
so that there are no delays. Coordination with production and other organizations may be
accomplished. A typical scheduled maintenance is turnaround maintenance of refineries.

Predictive Preventive Maintenance

i. Condition Monitoring (or Condition Monitor) Maintenance

This is a self-scheduled, machine-cued predictive maintenance that is based on the
periodic, and sometimes continuous, measurement of one or several parameters of
condition in an equipment such that a significant change is indicative of a developing
failure. Examples are measurement of the viscosity of engine oil in a working machine or
the amplitude of vibration of rotating machinery. The evolution of these parameters is
considered to be representative of the actual condition of the machine. Nevertheless, a
deviation from a reference value (e.g. temperature, viscosity, or vibration amplitude)
must occur to identify impending damages. In failure detection, the emphasis is on
inspection and test, since that is the best way to determine if warning signs of impending
failure are occurring. In order for condition monitoring to be effective, the failure must
not be catastrophic. The pay-off from inspection is best with a slow wear-out situation.

ii. On-Condition Maintenance

On-condition maintenance is a type of maintenance based on previous database of
failures of the system to predict when increasing failures of certain types may be
alleviated by preventive maintenance. It is necessary to establish targets and run
frequency ratios on failure rates and parts usage that may indicate problem areas. The
Weibull distribution is particularly useful for projecting the point at which maintenance
should be done in order to head off future failures. With sophisticated data processing
systems, it is possible to evaluate a specific machine’s performance and potential failures
based on the machine’s use, environment, operator skill, and other influencing
conditions.

Levels of Maintenance

Categorisation or ranking of the different approaches to the delivery of maintenance

based on the consideration of the type of (maintenance) equipment used (hand tools,
power tools, diagnostic equipment, etc), personnel (skilled or unskilled), infrastructure

3
(sheds, workshops, buildings, etc), nature of work done (service, repair) and the extent of
work done (man-hours, number of parts replaced, etc).

There are several approaches to the delivery of maintenance. One approach simplifies the
tasks through initial investment in design for maintainability so that operators or
relatively low-skilled service technicians can easily troubleshoot the failures and make
quick repairs to restore full performance. Another approach holds that the technician of
the future should all be people with high level of intelligence, and diagnostic and repair
ability.
The major levels of maintenance in common use are user/operator, intermediate,
organizational, depot and factory.

i. User/Operator Level of Maintenance

This is the situation where the user/operator carries out the maintenance required on the
equipment. Many customers or equipment operators are interested in doing as much as
possible maintenance before they need an expensive maintenance call. This should be
encouraged as long as it does not present a safety hazard or potential equipment damage,
since it gets equipment back in use quickly and satisfies the customers.

ii. Intermediate Level of Maintenance

This is a level of maintenance in which mobile, semi-mobile or fixed specialized
organizations and installations carry out the maintenance. Skilled and semi-skilled and
fairly well-equipped personnel are generally available at this level. Fixed installations
(permanent workshops) are generally established to support lower levels of maintenance,
within specific geographical areas. These (fixed installations) units perform maintenance
tasks that cannot, due to limited personnel skills and test equipment, be accomplished by
mobile units.

iii. Organisational Level of Maintenance

This is a situation where the maintenance is carried out by the organization or company
using the equipment. The organization has a workshop, personnel and required tools and
equipment for maintenance activities. For example, at OAU, the Division of Maintenance
Services is operating at the organisational level of maintenance.

iv. Depot Level of Maintenance

In this case, the maintenance is carried out at a central service centre. For this to take
place, the product has to be transported to the depot. Thus, method is restricted to
products that can be transported to the depot by the customer.

This means that maintenance engineers/technicians do not need to spend their time
travelling to the customer and can do repairs where spare parts and test equipment are
available under good working conditions. Special diagnostic equipment that is too
expensive to provide to each individual technician can be used at such a repair centre.

v. Factory Level of Maintenance

This is the level of maintenance in which the items to be maintained are sent back to the
manufacturing company to be worked upon by its own staff.

4
Implications of Poor or No Maintenance
Poor maintenance or non-maintenance could lead to minor to serious injuries to the
operator or user of equipment. It could also lead to expensive repairs. As shown in Table
1 below, preventive maintenance is definitely better than corrective maintenance.

Table 1: Implications of poor or no maintenance of a car

S/N Maintenance task Cost of Probable Cost of

preventive consequences consequence
Maintenance of not carrying
N out task N
1 Checking of engine 50.00 Knocking of 25 000.00 +
oil level engine
2 Changing of engine 1 000.00 Knocking of 25 000.00 +
oil engine
3 Checking of coolant 50.00 Knocking of 25 000.00 +
level engine
4 Checking of braking 50.00 Brake failure Writing-off
system Injuries/Death
5 Checking of brake 50.00 Brake failure Writing-off
fluid level Injuries/Death
.
Resources Needed for Maintenance

The resources needed for equipment maintenance are human, financial, material and
time. For effective plant maintenance the resources have to be provided in the right mix.

i. Human Resource (Personnel)

The special nature of equipment maintenance requires personnel that have some relevant
technical/engineering training. The maintenance personnel are made up of engineers,
technicians and craftsmen. They need regular capacity-building through self-study, on-
the-job and external training and re-training.

ii. Financial Resource (Money)

Effective equipment maintenance is expensive. However, it is more cost-effective than
non-maintenance. Funds are needed to recruit and maintain the personnel, purchase the
necessary maintenance tools and set up a workshop, buy the needed spare parts and
maintenance consumables such as solvents and lubricants.

iii. Material Resource (Equipment)

For a typical business organization with a production plant, where many equipment have
to be maintained, a Maintenance Department (with a standard Workshop) is the ideal.
Such a workshop needs a full complement of test (or diagnostic) and repair tools. The
maintenance department may also need supportive equipment such as vehicles to reach
locations and/or to move personnel and maintenance tools around.

iv. Time Resource

Time is needed to inspect equipment, source spare parts, disassemble, replace/repair,
reassemble, and test equipment.

5
HOW TO DETERMINE THE TYPE OF MAINTENANCE

Introduction
The maintenance plan (or programme) of a company is a corporate plan devised to meet
the objectives of maintenance as desired by the company. It is part of the overall strategy
of the company in order to achieve its business goals.

The development of a maintenance plan for a plant starts with the determination of the
type of maintenance for each equipment that makes up the plant. By definition, a plant
could be defined as any of the following:

i. The equipment and often including the grounds and buildings, necessary to carry on
any industrial business e.g. manufacturing plant.
ii. The complete equipment or apparatus for a particular mechanical process or operation
e.g. the heating plant for a home.
iii. The buildings, equipment, etc of an institution e.g. the sprawling plant of a University.

The determination of the type of maintenance involves the following steps: inventory or
census of the plant, ranking of equipment and facilities, and selection of the type of
maintenance.

Inventory or census of the plant

An inventory of the plant is a stock-taking of the equipment and structures to be
maintained and their locations on the site or in the production line. The inventory will be
carried out using a Plant Inventory Form. Table 2 is an inventory form filled out for the
equipment of the water production plant shown in Figure 2.

Table 2: Inventory of a water production plant

S/N Location / Operation Equipment/Structure Rank*

1. Dam Site 1.1 Intake Valve 1
1.2 Dam 1
2. Low lift Pump 2.1 Low Lift Pumps 1
House 2.2 Pump Motors 1
2.3 Controls 1
3. Chemical House 3.1 Dosing Pumps 2
3.2 Chemical Mixer 2
4. Aerators 4.1 Scuffles 2
5. Chlorine House 5.1 Chlorinators 2
5.2 Chlorine Cylinders 2
6. Sedimentation 6.1 Sedimentation Tanks 2
Tanks 6.2 Dislodging Valves 2
7. Clarifiers 7.1 Clarifier Trays 2
7.2 Service Pipes 2
8. Filters 8.1 Filter Media 2
8.2 Nozzles 2
8.3 Sluice Valves 2
8.4 Back-washing Pumps 2
8.5 Blower 2
9. Underground 9.1 Non-return Valves 2
Storage 9.2 Tank Structure 2
9.3 Service pipes 2
10 High Lift Pump 10.1 High Lift Pump 1
House 10.2 Pump Motors 1
10.3 Controls 1
*Rank: 1 = Critical/Essential 2 = Important; 3 = Supportive
6
 Legend
LLP: Low-lift pump
CWT: Clear water tank
Chemical
HLP: High-lift pump
House

Alum Chlorine
Sedimentation
LLP Aerator Tanks Filters
Distribution

Lagoon

7
Dam
CWT HLP

Figure 2: Sketch of a water production plant.

Ranking of Equipment
The ranking of equipment is based on their criticality index. The criticality index is
determined by taking into account the machine’s purpose, redundancy (i.e. if the machine
fails, is there a standby machine which can take over its function?), cost of repair,
downtime impacts, health, safety and environment issues and a number of other key
factors. The criticality index is then used to select the optimum type of maintenance the
equipment should be subjected to. The criticality index puts all machines/structures into
one of three categories:

Critical/Essential Equipment
These are machines that are vital to the plant or process and without which the plant or
process cannot function. Machines in this category include the steam or gas turbines in a
power plant, crude oil export pumps on an oil rig or the cracker in an oil refinery. With
critical machinery being at the heart of the process it is seen to require high-frequency
routine maintenance(e.g. hourly) or full on-line condition monitoring to continually
record as much data from the machine as possible regardless of cost and is often specified
by the plant insurance.

Important Equipment
This is equipment whose breakdown results in either disruption in production (reduction
in quality and/or quantity) without stoppage in the short run, and/or insecurity in the
operations. The machines that mainly fall under this category are machines which
provide redundancy i.e. a process may need three pumps to operate but there may be four
pumps so if one pump fails the spare (redundant or standby) pump can be utilized. These
types of machine are normally boiler feed pumps in a power plant, air compressors and
export pumps on an oil refinery. Such equipment needs to be maintained regularly.

Supportive Equipment
This is equipment whose breakdown does not disrupt production, no matter how long the
breakdown lasts. Such a equipment may be operated to failure.

Selecting the Type of Maintenance

Based on the above ranking the type of maintenance for each equipment is based on its
ranking or importance in the plant as shown in Table 3.

Table 3: Type of maintenance based on equipment ranking

Type of ranking Type of maintenance

1 Critical/Essential Preventive
(Routine/Condition
Monitoring)
2 Important Preventive (Scheduled)
3 Supportive Corrective

The emphasis of maintenance should be on preventive maintenance (routine and

scheduled). This will reduce the number and intensity of malfunctions and breakdowns.
A good maintenance program should reduce the number and intensity of breakdowns to
the point where no more than 15 percent of the total maintenance effort is devoted to
breakdowns or emergency work. Without the benefit of a good preventive maintenance
programme, breakdowns or emergency work frequently account for 75 percent of the
total maintenance effort.

8
SPARE PARTS MANAGEMENT AND CONTROL OF MAINTENANCE COSTS

Spare Parts Management

Spare parts are components and assemblies that are completely interchangeable with like
items and can be used to replace items removed during maintenance. Spare part
management play a major role in the interval between the time a repairable item is
removed from use and the time it is again available in full serviceable condition. A good
spare parts management must balance, for optimum cost, the expense caused by plant or
equipment downtime, and the cost of procuring, storing, and issuing the spare parts.

Because time is money in business, a business organisation cannot afford that its
production line becomes idle because of non-availability of spare parts to revive a broken
down equipment. If this line of thought is towed to the extreme, then the varieties and
quantities of spare parts on hand may be so extensive that it is virtually impossible to run
out of any spare parts. This will minimize downtime, but will be achieved at a prohibitive
price since a huge capital may have to be tied down. Therefore, a balance must be struck
such that a sufficient stock of materials and parts should be on hand to minimize
downtime.

Classification of Spare Parts

Spare parts can be classified into two groups, namely: Class A and Class B spare parts.
Class A spare parts are spare part that involve high unit costs and are difficult to obtain or
need long lead times, while Class B spare parts are spare parts that have low unit costs
and/or require only short lead times.

Spare Parts Planning and Procurement

The major factors determining the quantity of each item to be stocked are the following:
i. Item cost
ii. Lead time
iii. Usage
iv. Downtime cost of the broken-down equipment

Holding stock, in whatever form, costs money. The capital tied up by the stock itself has
to be served by the payment of interest, and the land or warehouse needed for the stock,
and any quality deterioration that occurs, also costs money. Planning the correct amount
of spare part stock needed for maintenance purposes is therefore a very important
activity.

To find the optimum stock level (the level which results in minimum overall costs) for
consumables and fast-moving spare parts, mathematical expressions are required for the
two types of costs: carrying and re-ordering.

Carrying Cost
The average stock level is one-half the amount received in a shipment. Thus if the
quantity delivered to the store is D units per shipment and demand is evenly spread over
time, the average stock level will be D/2. Let K be the variable cost of stocking one items
for a year calculated as the interest on capital tied up plus other carrying cost involved in
holding one item of stock for a year. Then the total carrying cost per annum will be ½
DK.

9
Re-order cost
Generally, if Q items are to be consumed per annum and there are D items in each
delivery made on re-ordering, the number of deliveries required per annum is Q/D.
Suppose the cost per delivery is represented by

Cr = r + sD ……………………………………………………………………... (1)

where r and s are some numbers. The number s may be interpreted as the variable cost
per item; whist r re-represents the fixed costs per order. The re-ordering cost is associated
with book-keeping, telephoning, checking, etc.

∴ Total annual re-reordering cost will be given by (cost per delivery) x (number of
deliveries).
Q rQ
Cr = (r + sD) = + sQ …………………………………………………… (2)
D D

The total cost that the company incurs on its stock is the sum of the two costs (1) and (2)
giving
1 rQ
C = Cc + Cr = DK + + sQ ………………………………………………. (3)
2 D
dC K rQ
= − …………………………………………………………………. (4)
dD 2 D 2

At the turning point, D is minimum, and therefore:

dC
= 0 …………………………………………………………………………. (5)
dD

K rQ
= ……………………………………………………………………….. (6)
2 D2

 rQ 
∴ D =  2  …………………………………………………………….…. (7)
 K 

This is the value of D which minimizes the cost in equation (3).

Re-order Levels
Re-order level is the level to which the stock is allowed to all before a fresh order is
placed. In the preceding section it was tacitly assumed that the end of each period the
stock could be allowed to run out, be replenished instantaneously, and then allowed to
run again, and so on. In practice, sales vary, replenishments are delayed, stock
deteriorate, perish, etc.
The re-order level caters for both a variable demand and a variable lead-time and will
equal the average demand in the average lead-time plus some buffer stock to allow for
the variations in demand and lead-time.

Mathematically:
R = QL + B …………………………………………………………………….. (8)
where,
R = re-order level

10
 Q = average demand per unit time
L = average lead-time, and
B = buffer stock

The buffer stock is the amount of extra stock that is kept in the system over and above
what would otherwise be required to cater for the variations in demand and lead-time. the
lead-time is the time taken for replenishment to arrive once they have been ordered.
The larger B is made, the smaller will be the chance of running out of stock but the larger
will be the capital tied up. Hence the problem is reduced to one of minimizing the
combined cost of holding the buffer stock B, together with the run out cost.
From experience, the buffer stock is usually a value between 20% and 25% of the
optimum shipment size or order size D.

Mathematically,
0.2D ≤ B ≤ 0.25D ……………………………………………………………… (9)

∴ Optimum re-order level is

R = Q x L + 0.225D ………………………………………………………….. (10)

Therefore, the lowest possible overall costs is then obtained by re-ordering to D items
every time the stock falls to R items.

Spare Parts Control

Items that have high unit costs, do not permit substitution in an emergency and are
difficult to obtain require close control. Conversely, items that have low unit costs will
not result in equipment downtime, and/or can be obtained quickly and easily warrant very
little stores control.

Inventory Card
For proper inventory control, every spare part must have an Inventory Card. This card
can be physical, in which case it is posted by hand or it may be electronic in which case it
is computerized.
Two types of records are frequently employed to limit the cost of stock control record
keeping:
Ø A detailed record for items involving high unit costs and long lead times, and
Ø A simplified system for low unit cost and/or short lead times.

Table 4 shows a simplified Inventory Card. Information on the card include part, name,
part number, classification specification, quantity received, quantity issued, balance, date,
etc.

Order Form
Another form that is used to monitor spare parts movement is the Order Form. An order
form is a form for requesting for spare parts from the spare parts store. Information on the
Order Form includes the following: equipment name, make, model, location,
maintenance card number, quantity and description of spare part needed, part number and
quantity issued. Other information include the name/signature of the requisitioning
officer, the collecting officer, and the issuing officer. Table 5 shows a typical Order
Form.

11
 Table 4: Spare Parts Inventory Card
Spare Parts Inventory Card
Part Name: Bearing Part No: 6206 2RS1
Classification: B
Specifications: 30 mm bore, sealed
Date Form* No Qty. Qty. Balance Receiving Issuing
Received Issued Officer Officer
1/2/96 3473 8 8 LOA RBC
3/3/97 444 2 6 KYO LOA
6/6/97 041 2 4 SOA LOA

* The form referred to is either a Waybill or an Order Form

Table 5: Order Form

ORDER FORM
Equipment Name: Pump
Make: Grundfos Model: SKT
Location: Chemical House
Maintenance Job Card No. 2424

Qty. Required Description Part No. Qty. Issued

2 30mm bore, sealed bearing 6206 2RS1 1

Name & Signatures:

Requisitioning Officer: ________________________________
Collecting Officer: ____________________________________
Issuing Officer: ______________________________________
To be completed in Quadruplicate

Spare Parts Storage

For ease of identification and retrieval, it is recommended that spare parts be stored in
properly labeled open shelves or bins.

Control of Maintenance Costs

Introduction
In industry, maintenance has always been thought of as a necessary evil. In the past,
every effort was made to keep expenditure on maintenance to a minimum rather than an
optimum. Since the entire cost of a maintenance activity was considered an overhead
expense, there was great reluctance to add overhead to overhead. Fortunately, the
accelerated trend towards mechanization and automation has forced management to look
more objectively at the role of the maintenance department. Automation has tended to
reduce direct-labour costs and to increase the importance of maintenance activities. The

12
emphasis now is towards optimizing maintenance costs rather than holding them to a
minimum. The interplay of the following factors control maintenance costs.

Costs of Spare Parts

High cost of spare parts will increase maintenance cost while low spare parts cost will
reduce maintenance costs. The cost of spare parts can be controlled by bulk-purchasing
(when feasible), checking pilfering and proper inventory control.
Labour Cost
The cost of labour depends on the maintenance organization adopted; whether work is
done by staff members or by external contractors, the competence of the maintenance
crew, etc. The cost of labour can be controlled by proper personnel training, adequate
supervision of personnel and assigning work to competent personnel.

Delays, Administrative Bottle-necks, Etc

Delays and administrative bottle-necks result in increased downtime. These could be due
to waiting for funds to be released or waiting for spare parts. Delays, administrative
bottle-necks, etc. can be controlled by proper inventory control to reduce downtime due
to “waiting for repair,” and proper planning of maintenance.

Improper Use of the Equipment

Improper use of the equipment will lead to frequent malfunctions and breakdowns. It is
therefore necessary to properly train equipment operators in order to control maintenance
costs.

Maintainability of the Equipment

The maintainability of an equipment is the inherent characteristic of a design or
installation that determines the ease, economy, safety, and accuracy with which
maintenance actions can be performed. It determines the ability to restore a product to
service or to perform preventive maintenance within required limits. Maintainability is
not within the control of the end-user of the equipment. However, the effects of
maintainability could be controlled by proper equipment selection.

4. CORRECTIVE OR REPAIR MAINTENANCE

Introduction
There are some standard procedures or steps to be taken before a proper repair /
corrective maintenance can be successfully carried out. The most important step is
correct diagnosis of the problem. Further steps are determining the corrective action
required, and then repair

Diagnostic Analysis
This is the process of locating and explaining detectable problems in an equipment from
its signs and symptoms. For a correct diagnosis to take place, 7 basic steps have to be
followed.
• Know the system
• Interrogate the operator
• Inspect the equipment
• Operate the equipment (if possible)
• List the possible causes
• Reach a conclusion
• Test your conclusion

13
Diagnostic Charts
These are charts of problems and their possible causes.

Trouble-shooting
Trouble-shooting is the finding and correcting of faults in equipment. Same steps as in
diagnostic analysis are followed plus the following. Faults are corrected by repairing
(removing/replacement, removing/repairing, re-installing) adjusting/aligning, calibrating
and testing.

In order to assist young and/or inexperienced maintenance personnel, troubleshooting

charts of many common equipment are available.

REFERENCES

1. L. O. Adekoya and P. A. Otono, 1990. “Repair and maintenance costs of

agricultural tractors in Nigeria”. Tropical Agriculture, Vol. 67(2): 119-122.
2. Bruel and Kjaer, Ref. Bulletin No. BO 0094 – 11 “Vibration measurement in
predictive maintenance” pages 3 –11.
3. John Deere, 1973. “Fundamentals of Machine Operation: Preventive
Maintenance”. John Deere Publications.
4. Patton, J. D. J., 1980. Maintainability and Maintenance Management. The
Instrument Society of America, pages 8 – 19.

14
 APPENDIX
TERMS AND DEFINITIONS

Alignment: The placing of a variable setting to a condition within tolerance.

Allocation: Assignment or distribution for a specific purpose or to particular persons
or things.
Availability: The probability that a system or equipment will, when used under
specified conditions, operate satisfactorily and effectively. Also, the
percentage of time or number of occurrences for which a product will
operate properly when called upon. Inherent Availability (Ai) is “pure, as
designed,” and considers only corrective maintenance time. Achieved
Availability (Aa) includes preventive maintenance time, but with an ideal
support environment. Operational Availability (Ao) considers total
downtime, which includes administrative and supply times.
Breakdown: An unexpected change in duty status from operational to non-operational,
due to (mechanical or electrical) failure.
Built-In Test Equipment (BITE): Diagnostic and checkout devices integrated into
equipment to assist operation and service.
Calibrate: To verify the accuracy of equipment and assure performance within
tolerance, usually by comparison to a reference standard that can be traced
to a primary standard.
Capital: Durable items with life or value that allow them to be used a long time. An
accounting classification, contrasted with expense.
Checkout: Determination of the working condition of a system.
Component: A constituent part.
Configuration: The arrangement and contour of the physical and functional characteristics
of systems, equipment, and related items of hardware or software; the
shape of a thing at a given time. The specific parts used to construct a
machine.
Consumables: Materials used up during equipment’s operation, as are fuel and engine oil
in a car.
Corrective Maintenance (CM): Unscheduled maintenance or repair actions, performed as
a result of failures or deficiencies to restore items to a specific condition.
See also Unscheduled Maintenance and Repair.
Critical: Describes items especially important to product performance and more
vital to operation than non-critical items.
Customer: Person or organization that purchases a service or commodity, usually
frequently and systematically.
Downtime: That portion of calendar time during which an item or equipment is not in
condition to fully perform its intended function.
Economic Life: The useful life of a machine after which it becomes uneconomical to
repair.
Economic Repair: A repair that will restore the product to sound condition at a cost
less than the value of its estimated remaining useful life.
Emergency Maintenance: Corrective, unscheduled repairs.
Equipment: All items of a durable nature capable of continuing or repetitive utilization
by an individual or organization.
Failure: Inability to perform the basic function, or to perform it within specified
limits; malfunction.

15
Failure Analysis: The logical, systematic examination of an item or its design, to identify
and analyze the probability, causes, and consequences of real or potential
malfunction, or failure.
Failure Rate: The number of failures per unit measure of life (cycles, time, kilometres,
events, and the like) as applicable for the item.
Function: A separate and distinct action required to achieve a given objective, to be
accomplished by the use of hardware, computer programs, personnel,
facilities, procedural data, or a combination thereof; or an operation a
system must perform to fulfil its mission or reach its objective.
Functional Levels: Rankings of the physical hierarchy of a product. Typical levels of
significance from the smallest to the largest are part, sub-assembly,
assembly, subsystem, and system.
General and Administrative (G&A): A category of expense, usually added as a
percentage of direct labour and materials costs, to cover support and
management costs.
General Support Equipment (GSE): Equipment that has maintenance application to
more than a single model or type of equipment. See also Support
Equipment.
Hardware: A physical object or physical objects, as distinguished from capability or
function. A generic term dealing with physical items of equipment – tools,
instruments, components, part – as opposed to funds, personnel, services,
programs, and plans, which are termed – “software”.
Human Engineering: The application of knowledge about human capabilities and
limitations to the planning, design, development, and testing of systems,
equipment, and facilities to obtain the best mix of safety, comfort, and
effectiveness compatible with established requirement.
Identification: Means by which items are named or numbered to indicate that they have a
given set of characteristics. Identification may be in terms of name, part
number, type, model, specification number, drawing number, code, stock
number, or catalogue number, Items may also be identified as part of an
assembly, a piece of equipment, or a system.
Installation: A fixed or relatively fixed facility location together with its real estate,
buildings, structures, utilities, and equipment. Also, that period of initial
setup, adjustment, and checkout of a product in the customer’s
environment.
Integrated Logistics Support (ILS): A composite of the elements necessary to assure the
effective and economical sustaining of a system or equipment at all levels
of maintenance, throughout its programmed life cycle. It is characterized
by the harmony and coherence obtained among each of its elements and
level of maintenance.
Interface: A common boundary between two or more items, characteristics, systems,
functions, activities, departments, or objectives. That portion of anything
that impinges upon or directly affects something else.
Inventory: All items on hand by physical count, weight, volume, monetary value, or
other measurement.
Item: A generic term used to identify a specific entity under consideration. Items
may be parts, components, assemblies, subassemblies, accessories, groups,
equipments, or attachments.
Lead Time: The allowance made for that amount of time required to accomplish a
specific objective.
Life Cycle: The series of phases or events that constitute the total existence of

16
 anything. The entire “womb to tomb” scenario of a product from the time
concept planning is smarted until the product is finally discarded.
Life-Cycle Cost: All costs associated with the system life cycle including research
and development, production, operation, support, and termination.
Logistics: The art and science of the management, engineering, and technical
activities concerned with requirements, design, and planning and
maintaining resources to support objectives, plans, and operations.
Long-Range Planning: The process of making decision expected to affect an
organization, usually beyond one year. The period of long-range plans is
often set at three, five, or ten years. Contrasted with short-range planning,
which normally includes from the present to one year in the future?
Maintainability (M): The inherent characteristic of a design or installation that determines
the ease, economy, safety and accuracy with which maintenance actions
can be performed. Also, the ability to restore a product to service or to
perform preventive maintenance within required limits.
Maintainability Engineering: The application of applied scientific knowledge,
methods and management skills to the development of equipment,
systems, projects, or operations that have the inherent ability of being
effectively and efficiently maintained.
Maintenance: The function of keeping items or equipment in, or restoring them to,
serviceable condition. It includes servicing, test, inspection,
adjustment/alignment, removal, replacement, reinstallation,
troubleshooting, calibration, condition determination, repair, modification,
overhaul, rebuilding, and reclamation. Maintenance includes both
corrective and preventive activities.
Maintenance Engineering: Developing concepts, criteria, and technical
requirements for maintenance during the conceptual and acquisition
phases of a project. Providing policy guidance for maintenance activities,
and exercising technical and management direction and review of
maintenance programme.
Management: The effective, efficient, economical leadership of people and use of
money, materials, time, and space to achieve predetermined objectives. It
is a process of establishing and attaining objectives and carrying out
responsibilities that include planning, organizing, directing, staffing,
controlling, and evaluating.
Material: All items used or needed in any business, industry, or operation as
distinguished from personnel.
Mean Downtime (MDT): Average time a system cannot perform its mission;
including response time, active maintenance, supply time, and
administrative time.
Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF): The average time/distance/events a product
delivers between breakdowns.
Mean Time Between Maintenance (MTBM): The average time between both corrective
and preventive actions.
Mean Time Between Replacements (MTBR): Average use of an item between
replacements due to maintenance or any other reason.
Mean Time To Repair (MTTR): The average time it takes to fix a failed item.
Mode: The most frequently occurring data value. Also type of failure.
Modification: Change in configuration.
Modularization: Separation of components of a product or equipment into physically

17
 and functionally distinct entities to facilitate identification, removal and
replacement unitization.
On-Condition Maintenance: Inspection of characteristics which will warn of pending
failure and performance of preventive maintenance after the warning
threshold but before total failure.
Operating Time: Time during which equipment is performing in a manner acceptable
to the operator.
Overhaul: A maintenance procedure for machinery involving disassembly,
inspecting, refinishing, adjusting, and replacement of parts, and
reassembly and testing. The procedure renews the efficiency of the
equipment and maintains its usefulness.
Overhead: Costs which are not directly traceable to products, operations, or services;
indirect.
Personnel Employees: Also, the name of the organization concerned with people.
Pipeline: Channel of support by means of which material or personnel flow from
sources of procurement to their point of use.
Preventive Maintenance (PM): Actions performed in an attempt to keep an item in a
specified operating condition by means of systematic inspection,
detection, and prevention of incipient failure. See also Scheduled
Maintenance.
Production: A term used to designate manufacturing or fabrication in an organized
enterprise.
Provisioning: The process of determining and selecting the varieties and quantities of
repair parts, spares, special tools, and test and support equipment that
should be procured and stocked to sustain equipment and systems for
specified periods of time.
Reaction Time/Response Time: The time required between the receipt of an order or
impulse triggering some action and the initiation of the action.
Rebuild/Recondition: Total teardown and reassembly of a product, usually to the latest
configuration.
Redundancy/ Redundancy: Two or more parts, components, or systems joined
functionally so that if one fails, some or all of the remaining components
are capable of continuing with function accomplishment; fail-safe;
backup.
Refurbish: Clean and replace worn parts on a selective basis to make the product
usable to a customer. Less involved than rebuild.
Reliability (R): The probability that an item will perform its intended function without
failure for a specified time period under specified conditions.
Repair: The restoration or replacement of component of facilities or equipment as
necessitated by wear, tear, damage, or failure in order to return the facility
or equipment to efficient operating condition.
Repair Parts: Individual parts or assemblies required for the maintenance or repair of
equipment, systems, or spares. Such repair parts may be repairable or non-
repairable assemblies or one-piece items. Consumable supplies used in
maintenance, such as wiping rags, solvent, and lubricants, are not
considered repair parts.
Repairable Item: Durable item determined by application of engineering, economic, and
other factors to be restorable to serviceable condition through regular
repair procedures.
Replaceable Item: Hardware that is functionally interchangeable with another item but
differs physically from the original part to the extent that installation of

18
 the replacement requires such operations as drilling, reaming, cutting,
filing, or shimming in addition to normal attachment or installation
operations.
Resources: Manpower, funds, materials, equipment, tools, space, and time available
for a required to accomplish specific objectives.
Retrofits: Modifications to a machine to correct a deficiency, to modernize it, or to
improve performance.
Safety: Elimination of hazardous conditions that could cause injury. Protection
against failure, breakage, and accident.
Salvage: The saving or reuse of condemned, discarded, or abandoned property, and
of materials contained therein for re-use or scraping. As a noun, it refers to
property that has some value in excess of its basic material content, but is
in such condition that it has no reasonable prospect of original use, and its
repair or rehabilitation is clearly not practical.
Scheduled Maintenance (SM): Pre-planned actions performed to keep an item in
specified operating condition by means of systematic inspection,
detection, and prevention of incipient failure. Sometimes called preventive
maintenance, but actually a subset of PM.
Scrap: Property or items, discarded as far as original use is concerned, that have
no reasonable prospect of value except for the recovery value of basic
material content.
Serviceability: Characteristics of an item, equipment, or system that make it easy to
maintain after it is put into operation. Similar to Maintainability.
Service Technician: The person who installs and maintains equipment. Also called
Customer Engineer, Technical Representative, Service Engineer or
Mechanic.
Shelf life: The period of time during which an item can remain unused in proper
storage without significant determination.
Spares: Components, assemblies, and equipment that are completely inter-
changeable with like items and can be used to replace items removed
during maintenance.
Specification: Documents that clearly and accurately describe the essential technical
requirements for materials, items, equipment, systems, or services;
including the procedures by which it will be determined that the
requirements have been met, such documents may include performance,
support, preservation, packaging, and marking requirements.
Support: Action to sustain or complement anything to keep it effective by
furnishing it with whatever it needs.
Support Equipment: Items required to maintain systems in effective operating condition
under various environments. Support equipment includes general and
special-purpose vehicles, power units, stands, test equipment, tools, or test
benches needed to facilitate or sustain maintenance action, to detect or
diagnose malfunctions, or to monitor the operational status of equipment
and systems.
System: Assemblage of correlated hardware, software; methods, procedures, and
people, or any combination of these, all arranged or ordered toward a
common objective.
System Effectiveness: The probability that a system can successfully meet an overall
operational demand within a given time, when operated under specific
conditions; the ability of a system to do the job for which it was intended;

19
 a measure of the degree to which a system can be expected to achieve its
objectives or purpose.
Systems Engineering: The application of scientific and engineering methods to the study,
planning, design, construction, direction, and evaluation of man-machines
systems and system components.
Technical Data and Information: Includes, but is not limited to, production and
engineering data, prints and drawings, documents such as standards,
specifications, technical manuals changes in modifications, inspection and
testing procedures, and performance and failure data.
Test and Support Equipment: All special tools and checkout equipment, metrology and
calibrations equipment, maintenance stands, and handling equipment
required for maintenance. Includes external and built-in test equipment
(BITE) considered part of the supported system or equipment.
Trade off: Action or decision generally concerned with the evaluation of alternatives
and with compromises to obtain the best mix of support characteristics,
system performance, and real cost.
Training: The pragmatic approach to supplementing education with particular
knowledge and assistance in developing special skills. Helping people to
learn to practice an art, science, trade, profession, or related activity.
Basically more specialized than education and involves learning what to
do rather than why it is done.
Troubleshooting: Locating or isolating and identifying discrepancies or malfunctions of
equipment and determining the corrective action required.
Turnaround Time: Interval between the time a repairable item is removed from use and
the time it is again available in full serviceable condition.
Unscheduled Maintenance (UM): Emergency maintenance (EM) or corrective
maintenance (CM) to restore a failed item to usable condition.
Value Engineering: An organized, applied scientific effort directed at analyzing the
design, construction, procurement, inspection, installation, operation, and
maintenance of an item to achieve the necessary performance, reliability,
and maintainability at the lowest overall cost.
Vendor Items: Items or parts acquired by the equipment manufacturer or prime contractor
without the acquisition of the design rights; where the source has and
retains proprietary rights with respect to design and processes.
Warranty: Guarantee that an item will perform as specified for at least a specified
time.

20