Kingsmill 'eye opener'
2 Sep 2010
Allied Mills has managed to fully reverse the ratio of unplanned versus planned maintenance following the implementation of an SKF maintenance programme.
The flour manufacturer, part of Associated British Foods, operates mills in Tilbury, Manchester and Belfast. The facilities supply the group’s bakeries throughout the UK, supporting bread brands such as Kingsmill and Sunblest.
Planned work now accounts for 90% of the total at the company’s process facilities, which employ many rotating elements. Significant reductions have also been made in the company’s stores value and stock-holding costs.
The existing processes and procedures had delivered significant benefits, but in an increasingly challenging manufacturing environment, the focus was shifting towards providing long-term sustainability and a value-added service from manufacturing teams, according to Duncan Lawson, group engineering manager at Allied Mills.
SKF’s team first carried out client needs analyses (CNAs) at each of the three Allied Mills’ plants. These were conducted during discussions between key managers and engineers to gain a snapshot of the current maintenance strategy and its overall efficiency.
CNAs use assessment questions from each of the four main facets of SKF’s asset efficiency optimisation (AEO) process. This is focused on: improving processes, culture and technology; maintenance strategy; work identification; work control and work execution, and provided the basis for an action plan at Allied Mills.
Described as, “a real, eye-opening, learning process”, by Lawson, the CNA process highlighted many preventative activities that Allied Mills could undertake using in-house expertise, as well as the need for a significant maintenance strategy review.
SKF asset management services got the green light to review all maintenance tasks. One selling point was that Allied Mills used similar equipment at all three of its plants, so processes and procedures could therefore be standardised.
The SKF team examined the majority of the plant and used a failure modes and effect analysis (FMEA) to determine the best maintenance approach for all assets. They studied each piece of equipment and machinery, breaking it down into its component parts, in order to envisage the impact that a failure might have.
The team also looked at the spares stock, the existing maintenance schedule and whether it was reactive or predictive, as well as the general performance of the maintenance discipline. These results informed the first major changes in the maintenance ethos at Allied Mills.
The first major change identified was departmental, as Lawson explained: “We quickly realised that we were weak at interfacing between production operations and maintenance. They were very much perceived as two separate entities and, at times, operated as other companies, between them.”
The first step, therefore, was to integrate them into one department, having them both report to a new internally-appointed, manufacturing manager. Almost instantly, said Lawson, both departments gained visibility of each other in terms of agenda and operations, and team working was thus enhanced.
SKF’s integration work also saw a computerised maintenance management system (CMMS) transformed into a manufacturing tool, enhancing its benefits and effectiveness to the enterprise as a whole.
Lawson added: “We also realised that there were areas to which we had given too much prominence in our maintenance strategy … In some instances, we learnt that it was okay simply to let something come to the end of its lifecycle and then replace it; it was not deemed a critical component and did not warrant the level of support we were giving to it. In other cases the reverse was true.”
