A hybrid of industrial maintenance decision making grids

Abstract

It is fair to assume that the main challenge in maintenance decision-making is the existence of gaps between theory and sustainable practice which is attributable to complexity, too much emphasis on development of new models that only serve to criticize earlier ones, underrepresentation of case study-based researches and lack of adequate incorporation of industry-based knowledge into most theoretical studies. In this paper, we revisited the application of decision making grids (DMG) for maintenance optimization but the main novelty here is harmonizing the strengths of the two most popular DMG approaches as opposed to the previous trends of advocating one over the other. The current initiative limits assumptions associated with the process, since both approaches depend on the main objective and nature of data involved. The data required for implementation are breakdown frequency and downtime for each event, which is readily available within most in-house maintenance management systems.

Keywords:

• Manufacturing systems
• industrial maintenance
• decision analysis
• decision making grid
• maintenance strategies
• case study

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Akilu Yunusa-Kaltungo

Akilu Yunusa-Kaltungo, BEng, MSc, PGDip-Mgt, PhD, CEng, FIMechE, FHEA, obtained his first degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Maiduguri, Nigeria. He then joined LafargeHolcim Cement PLC, first as a junior Methods/Reliability engineer and later as the Maintenance Team Leader on a multi-million pounds coal grinding plant project. In 2008, Akilu moved to the UK for his MSc in Maintenance Engineering and Asset Management (now known as Reliability Engineering and Asset Management) at the School of Mechanical, Aerospace and Civil Engineering (MACE), during which his MSc dissertation won the European Federation for National Maintenance Societies Award for ‘Best Master’s Thesis in Maintenance Engineering from the United Kingdom’. Upon completing his MSc in 2009, Akilu re-joined LafargeHolcim PLC where he served as training and learning manager; health and safety manager; and maintenance manager. In late 2012, Akilu returned to the University of Manchester for his PhD in Condition Monitoring of Rotating Machines, with particular interest in the development of data fusion techniques that can simplify fault detection and classification. During this time, he authored over 30 refereed papers, a book and reviewed more than 90 research articles published in internationally recognized journals and conference proceedings. Akilu has been a lecturer in Plant Reliability and Maintenance Engineering within the School of MACE since November 2015. He is currently principal investigator for two research projects.

Ashraf Labib

Ashraf W. Labib, BSc, MBA, MSc, PhD, CEng, FIET FORS, SFHEA, is a Professor at University of Portsmouth, UK. He served as Associate Dean for Research and has been the Director of the DBA Programme. His main research interest lies in the field of Operational Research and Decision Analysis in applications such as reliability, risk, security and healthcare. Prior to joining Portsmouth Business School, he was a Senior Lecturer in the Manufacturing Division of the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Manufacturing Engineering at UMIST (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology). He holds a PhD and MSc from Univ. of Birmingham, an MBA from the American University in Cairo, and a BSc in Mechanical Engineering from University of Cairo. He is a Fellow of the Operational Research Society (ORS), a Fellow of the IET, a Senior Fellow of HEA and a Chartered Engineer. He published over 140-refereed papers in professional journals and international conferences proceedings, with H-index of 23. He published a book Learning from Failures: Decision Analysis of Major Disasters (2014). He received five awards: 1999, 2000, 2008, 2012, and 2019 ‘Highly Commended’ awards for five published papers from the Literati Club, MCB Press (a publisher of 140 journals). He served as the Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions SMC (Systems, Man, and Cybernetics). He was a guest editor of special issues for the Journal of Logistics Information Management in the area of Crisis Management, and for Journal of Modelling in Management in the area of multi-criteria decision methods. He is active in attracting research-funded projects from EPSRC (2 awards), ESRC (2 awards), European Commission (5 awards) and numerous funding from industry.