Maintenance and reliability improvement - root cause analysis
Venue: Engineers Ireland, 22 Clyde Road, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4
Date: 26th April, 2010
Session time: 9.00 am to 5.00 pm. Registration and Tea/Coffee at 8.30am
Fee: Engineers Ireland members €350 / Non members €450
CPD credit: 1
Note: Delegates attending RCA and FMECA avail of a special reduced rate of €600 for both days.
Course aim
This course equips delegates to perform robust, systematic and effective root cause analyses, using a well proven methodology.
Overview
The need for asset efficiency and safety are key drivers for any industry. Improving maintenance and reliability ensures the optimum performance of assets against a backdrop of ageing plant, stringent legislation and cost pressures. Maintenance needs to improve the integrity and availability of assets while minimising costs.
One of the fundamental building blocks of maintenance improvement is root cause analysis. Understanding the cause of failures or incidents is the first step in preventing the reoccurrence of failures. Analysis of root causes also provides indications of systemic problems with maintenance regimes. Tackling these systemic problems can deliver significant reliability improvements and cost savings.
The benefits of identifying and eliminating the causes of failures are only achieved if the method for identifying the root causes is robust, systematic and well executed. A cursory investigation of failures will not get to the root cause of the failures and will result in the wrong ‘corrective’ actions being taken.
Learning objectives
- How to define failures and problems clearly
- How to perform the ‘5 Whys’ RCA process
- How to record RCAs using a cause tree diagram.
- How to apply RCA to real-life problems
Programme
- Introduction – why RCA is important
- Problem definition
- The RCA process
- Recording a RCA
- Identifying the primary cause
- Group exercise
Who should attend
All engineers needing a method for identifying the root cause of problems – maintenance and engineering managers, plant engineers, reliability engineers, operations managers, maintenance technicians and supervisors.
Trainers' profiles
Martin Brown,C Eng. MIMechE, is a principal consultant with ABB Engineering Services. He is an experienced practitioner involved in improving maintenance, reliability and integrity for a wide range of companies across the chemical, oil & gas and pharmaceutical industries. Martin worked for many years in the chemical industry in maintenance engineering, before moving into consultancy.
Laurence Plant, C Eng. MIMechE, is also a principal consultant with ABB Engineering Services. He has been responsible for maintenance, reliability and integrity improvement projects across a wide range of companies. Laurence worked for many years in the pharmaceutical, chemical and brewing industries in maintenance engineering and management, before moving into consultancy.
Additional information
The course is highly interactive using a mixture of presentations, case studies, discussions, group exercises and a simulation.