|
By: Clayton Smith and George Munn –
Revitalizing a Preventive Maintenance Program
The Smurfit-Stone paperboard mill at Fernandina
Beach, Florida, finds opportunities to increase mill productivity and
reduce costs by improving their preventive maintenance program.
In recent years, Smurfit-Stone’s Fernandina Beach mill fell from
the ranks of the most cost-effective and profitable mills in the corporation.
It didn't happen as a result of increasing costs, but as a result of the
company adding 20 additional mills through mergers and acquisitions. Smurfit-stone,
Fernandina Beach found itself in direct competition, not only with other
companies’ mills, but also with its own sister mills.
Before 1998, Smurfit-stone, Fernandina Beach only had to be more cost-effective
than the one other linerboard mill in its division. Management decided
to address the new competitive situation specifically by addressing maintenance
operations and costs, and equipment reliability through an improved preventive
maintenance program.
Fernandina Beach is a fully integrated, ISO 9002-certified kraft linerboard
mill with production capacity of 2,850 tpd. Its three machines produce
liner in weights from 26 lbs. to 69 lbs, using a combination of kraft
and recycled pulp. The mill operates a large wood yard that receives both
chips and round wood, batch and Kamyr digester pulp mills, a recovery
system including two recovery boilers, two power boilers, two turbine
generators and all the associated water and waste treatment facilities
for a large mill.
 |
Of the mill’s 495 hourly employees,
165 are maintenance mechanics, including 110 mechanical journeymen
and 55 electrical/instrumentation technicians.
Three board machines at Smurfit-Stone's Fernandina
Beach mill produce linerboard in weights ranging from 26 lbs. to
69 lbs. Photograph courtesy Smurfit-Stone |
Measurement by Benchmarks
Smurfit-Stone has conducted extensive benchmarking studies of all aspects
of operating costs at each of its 21 locations. In the maintenance area,
internal maintenance costs, outside contract utilization, stores inventories
and staffing have been compared. Fernandina Beach managers recognized
that significant reductions could be made in the mill’s maintenance
costs to contribute to the its economic well-being. Cost reductions could
be made in 1) equipment reliability, 2) planning and scheduling, 3) outside
services and contracts, and 4) stores inventory.
The number of occurrences that were leading to major production interruptions
led to a review of the mill’s entire approach to preventive maintenance.
Management recognized that a sound preventive maintenance program was
the cornerstone of a successful equipment reliability improvement effort
and was directly proportional to the mill’s financial performance.
The decision was made to completely revisit and revitalize the mill’s
entire preventive maintenance program.
Roles and Goals Revised
The first major initiative was to address the existing roles and responsibilities
of the various maintenance groups. Maintenance tasks had been conducted
by personnel in both day and shift maintenance groups. Day personnel were
to handle all maintenance issues within day shift hours and shift maintenance
personnel were responsible for issues occurring during other hours. Preventive
maintenance tasks were the primary responsibility of the day crew, with
some tasks handed off to shift personnel.
But break-in work and “emotional” maintenance decisions often
got higher priority than the preventive maintenance tasks on the schedule.
Management’s answer to this problem was to form a separate group
with only the responsibility for completing scheduled preventive maintenance.
Day maintenance was assigned the primary responsibility of completing
corrective repairs that had been properly planned and scheduled. The entire
maintenance department organization was revised to bring the entire reliability
program under the direct supervision of one leader. The group was given
a charter and a vision statement.
Shift maintenance in the mill was consolidated into a central concept
that consists of a supervisor and seven mechanics on a 12-hour shift schedule.
The intention was to take the break-in element out of the preventive maintenance
equation by assigning break-in work to shift maintenance. Break-in work
would be the exclusive responsibility of shift personnel.
The remainder of the department, including both mechanical and electrical/instrumentation
personnel, would work out of area-based shops supported by a planning
and scheduling department and a computerized maintenance management system.
In theory, all three groups were to be dedicated to particular portions
of the maintenance program and would not be distracted by tasks outside
their scopes. Management recognized, however, that it would take some
time for this concept to work as planned. Separating tasks into three
different groups called for discipline and significant cultural change,
but the goal was to minimize overlap of functions and tasks as much as
possible.
Planning and Scheduling
Recognizing that a significant portion of work orders were poorly planned—or
not planned at all—management undertook an initiative to improve
the planning and scheduling process. To give the day crews ample opportunity
to complete corrective repairs efficiently and effectively, work orders
needed to be well planned and ready for the mechanics when they received
their assignments.
A new process was implemented, including an emphasis on controlling any
backlog of work orders.
Maintenance Stores
An assessment of a rather high storeroom inventory revealed the urgency
of stocking the correct parts in the storeroom and getting the wrong parts
out of inventory. Benchmarking data showed that the inventory was considerably
higher than that of comparable mills. The storeroom often issued outdated
parts, no parts or the wrong parts.
But management recognized that this was the result of a weak preventive
maintenance program with an inadequate planning and scheduling effort,
and not the result of poor storeroom management. In fact, the storeroom
was managing quite well the parts that planners, supervisors and managers
had continued to keep in inventory. Getting the stores process under control
required good planning and scheduling, significant reductions in break-in
work and management assurance that the storeroom had the right parts of
maintenance jobs.
Implementing the Vision
Each initiative in the revamping of the Fernandina Beach preventive maintenance
program was assigned team members and a leader. An in-depth “gap”
analysis was conducted by the maintenance consulting firm of IDCON Inc.
to identify and measure the differences between the mill’s maintenance
practices and performance and that of high-performing maintenance organizations
in world-class mills. The teams used this analysis as a tool for goal
setting at Fernandina Beach.
IDCON’s services also included eight weeks of training spread over
a six-month period. The goal was to provide guidance in developing a new
preventive maintenance process, with training modules for both salaried
and hourly personnel. Mill management’s requirement for the program
development was that it not be a consultant’s production, but that
it be a process developed by mill personnel with a consultant’s
assistance. In order for the process to succeed, the affected personnel
had to be directly involved in and in control of the design changes.
The Challenge of Change
Lack of communication is always a great problem in an organization attempting
to implement change, but it can be the easiest to correct. The implementers
of change at Fernandina Beach used many different forums to communicate
the following: 1) why change needed to occur, 2) who would be affected,
and 3) when the change would occur. Implementation teams went to great
lengths to communicate with union leadership, management and all other
supervisors and salaried employees in the organization. Forums included
departmental meetings, special ad hoc communication meetings, and written
correspondence and brochures.
Changing the culture of a workplace is probably the most difficult barrier
to overcome in a work force. A cultural change was definitely required
at the Fernandina Beach mill. Completing preventive maintenance work is
of high importance, but was often given a low priority in scheduling.
With the changes that have been made, management is continually sending
the message to supervisors, planners and the hourly workforce that preventive
maintenance is a high priority and will be so treated. But management
also recognizes that it will take years of discipline to finally realize
the benefits of placing the highest priority on completing preventive
maintenance orders.
Clayton Smith is maintenance and engineering manager and George Munn is
reliability supervisor at Smurfit-Stone’s Fernandina Beach mill.
Consider Preventive Maintenance training and implementation support from
IDCON : More
> |
|
