How CMMS Supports PFMEA Implementation
CMMS supports PFMEA by centralizing information, including data, real-time monitoring, and efficient maintenance processes. Because CMMS helps track equipment performance, spot patterns, and predict potential failures before they happen, PFMEA can identify and reduce risks more efficiently. CMMS sends real-time alerts when equipment is not performing as expected, allowing maintenance teams to address issues early and prevent larger problems. It also keeps a record of equipment usage, repairs, and inspections, which helps refine PFMEA assessments and prioritize critical maintenance tasks. By using CMMS with PFMEA, organizations can prevent failures, improve equipment reliability, ensure safety, and maintain smooth operations, reducing downtime and repair costs. This combination creates a strong system for managing maintenance and minimizing risks. What is PFMEA? Why Manufacturers Use PFMEA The Role of Maintenance in PFMEA Key Elements of PFMEA How CMMS Supports PFMEA The Benefits of PFMEA What Is PFMEA? Process Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (PFMEA) looks at each step of a process to determine possible failure points (failure modes), their causes, and their effects on the process or product. Next, manufacturers can assess the risks associated with failures and prioritize actions to reduce or eliminate them. The goal is to minimize the risk of failures and improve process reliability and quality. See how MPulse CMMS helped Siemens Building Technologies Group improve their lean manufacturing philosophy. Back to Top In short, combining CMMS with PFMEA helps manufacturers improve processes, predict and prevent equipment failures, and strengthen preventive maintenance. This approach optimizes resources, supports data-driven decisions, ensures safety, and boosts compliance, leading to a more efficient, reliable, and cost-effective operation. Back to Top
What Are the Most Important Maintenance Metrics and KPIs in Manufacturing?
Manufacturing facilities use many key performance indicators (KPIs) and other metrics to measure everything from cycle times to throughput to deliveries. For the maintenance team, manufacturing KPIs evaluate your team’s success in the areas you (or your bosses) care about, giving you a new level of insight on what’s going on in your department. How to Measure KPIs in a Company For the maintenance team, CMMS software uses the data gathered in every work order to create meaningful KPIs that tell you about the effectiveness of your maintenance strategies. First, you’ll want to pick KPIs that measure specific goals. Note that KPIs for your maintenance team may differ from the production team. Common maintenance goals in manufacturing facilities include… Reducing downtime Expanding planned maintenance programs Preventing equipment failures Decreasing costs Finding bottlenecks Tracking time or inventory Fine-tuning schedules Improving efficiency and productivity. Next, you’ll want to optimize your CMMS software to make sure you’re gathering the right data to evaluate performance in these specific areas. This data typically includes… Equipment records: asset information, including type, make and model, purchase date, associated inventory, location, etc. Maintenance records: tasks performed on an asset, including planned maintenance, unplanned repairs, work orders, inventory and supplies used, time required, etc. Inventory records: parts and supplies required to perform maintenance tasks, including part information, vendor details, stock levels, reorder points, etc. This data provides the basis of the KPIs and metrics you’ll track over time, helping you make informed decisions about your operations. Manufacturing KPI Examples Six maintenance KPIs that most MPulse customers find handy include… Planned Maintenance Percentage: the percentage of the total hours spent on PM maintenance activities over a specific period Preventative Maintenance Compliance (PMC): the percentage of scheduled PM tasks that get done in a specific time interval Mean Time to Repair (MTTR): the average time to evaluate and repair failed equipment Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF): the predicted time between failures of an asset during normal operation Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE): the percentage of manufacturing time that is truly productive Maintenance Backlog: the percentage of uncompleted tasks Additionally, manufacturing facilities may track other metrics or KPIs that apply specifically to this field… Total Cycle Time: the total time interval between start and finish of all operations, which shows how efficient a machine is Throughput: the rate of the number of units produced over time, either on a specific machine or line Capacity Utilization: a machine producing goods at an ideal cycle time is running at 100% capacity, so a lower percentage indicates available capacity Yield: a measure of quality and performance to identify processes that require substantive re-work, which will affect throughput and influence total cycle times Total Scrap / Total Product Run: percentage of discarded or rejected material from the manufacturing process, measured in either units or volume Availability: the measure of machine uptime and downtime, with the goal of identifying the causes of downtime to determine ways to reduce it These manufacturing KPIs are common, but you can track many more in MPulse Maintenance Software. Over time, MPulse helps you pinpoint trends and determine what areas need more attention. You also can create benchmarks to measure current performance against historic performance or goals. Have questions about setting up KPIs in CMMS software? Contact us. We can help.
What Mean Time Between Failures Means for Your Maintenance Team
The most valuable part of CMMS software is all the great information you get out of it. Mean time between failures (MTBF) is a common metric that’s very useful for managing maintenance operations. MTBF predicts the elapsed time between failures of an asset based on normal operation. In this case, “failure” is used to describe when the equipment is out of service and in an unrepaired condition. MTBF is predicting uptime for the equipment. Your organization can use this metric as an indicator of expected availability, as well as reliability. How Do You Calculate MTBF? The higher the MTBF, the more reliable the asset should be before failing. It’s calculated as the sum of start of downtime minus start of uptime, then divided by the number of failures: MTBF = ∑ (Start of Downtime – Start of Uptime) ÷ (Number of Failures) Most maintenance teams measure MTBF in usage hours, but you could use mileage or similar data. MTBF doesn’t include downtime for preventive maintenance tasks, and it assumes PMs can be planned for a time when the asset is not in use. It also assumes the asset is within its useful life cycle. How Does MTBF Help Your Maintenance Team? Most of the time maintenance managers use MTBF to project the likeliness of an asset failing during a certain period. Often maintenance teams can use MTBF to adjust inspections schedules or preventive maintenance tasks. For example, if the asset fails multiple times for the same reasons, you might not have found the root cause, or it’s time to add some PMs to prevent such failures. Some maintenance operations factor in MTBF when determining how much to charge, based on how likely the equipment is to fail. As a simple example, MPulse customer Felipe uses MTBF to create asset performance benchmarks. If his CMMS data shows a belt is likely to fail after 700 hours of usage, he sets up a new PM schedule where the belt is replaced before that time, such as around 650 hours of usage. MTBF is a good of example of how maintenance teams can use CMMS data to prevent failures before they happen. If you’re not using MTBF as a metric to measure your maintenance operations, contact us to learn how it can help your organization. We’re here to help.