How TPM helps chemical companies do basic management

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　　China is the base of manufacturing in the world. Various industries are booming in China. The most important thing in the manufacturing industry is the construction of grassroots management. However, companies have also faced the problem of frequent production equipment failures over the years. The industries that have been most troubled by this problem are continuous production industries, such as chemicals, pharmaceuticals, power plants, etc. Therefore, below we will make a detailed analysis and explanation of how TPM can help the implementation of the chemical industry. 　　First, let’s have a preliminary understanding of the chemical process and equipment. The production process of a chemical plant has the following characteristics. The plant area is usually very large. Materials between equipment are mostly transported through pipeline connections. Equipment is usually exposed outdoors. There are a large number of transmission equipment, such as circulation pumps, compressors, etc. When equipment breaks down, it usually cannot be repaired immediately, because once it is shut down for repairs, it will cause great losses to production. 　　Therefore, when chemical companies promote TPM, we do not recommend that it be fully implemented from the beginning. This will most likely end in failure. The main reasons are that the factory area is too large, there are too many equipments, and the grassroots operators are not familiar with TPM and usually have great resistance to TPM, so they will encounter great resistance when promoting it. ； Another reason is that due to insufficient manpower and the inability to comprehensively grasp the problem, TPM activities cannot achieve significant results in a short period of time, causing TPM implementation progress to be delayed again and again, and finally to end without any problem. 　　When promoting any activity or system, it is important to achieve short-term results. Because on the one hand, it can let everyone know that this method is effective, on the other hand, it can build everyone's confidence and continue to promote it. Therefore, based on our company’s experience in promoting TPM, we suggest that chemical companies that want to promote TPM can implement it step by step in a reasonable manner. 　　It is very important to first organize the TPM Promotion Committee to conduct on-site research and select TPM demonstration areas. Because the demonstration areas represent the future promotion model and the basis for everyone to follow, the demonstration areas must be carefully selected. The selected demonstration areas should initially have the following characteristics: 　　1. It is an important and representative area or workshop ； 　　2. The current equipment is in poor operating condition ； 　　3. Members of the demonstration area must be able to fully cooperate with TPM reform activities and be willing to fully implement and promote ； 　　Then the seed personnel in the demonstration area are selected and a TPM kick-off meeting is held, where senior leaders express their determination to implement TPM. This is followed by TPM training for promotion committee members and demonstration area seed personnel. The above is the first stage of TPM promotion – the preparation and startup stage. This phase is best completed within a month. 　　Secondly, the second stage will enter the rectification stage of the demonstration area. The interval between stage one and stage two should not be too long. It is best to proceed with it. When rectifying the TPM demonstration area, there should be someone who understands TPM implementation to guide everyone. ； For this candidate, the company can select people with practical experience in TPM from within the company or hire people from consulting companies to take on the role of guidance. The optimal implementation time for Phase 2 is 3 to 4 months. If the rectification time is estimated to exceed 4 months, it is recommended to reduce the scope of the demonstration area. Our suggested approach is as follows: Understand the equipment function and operation. For chemical plants, a demonstration area may include several systems (such as distillation system, thermal chlorination system, etc.), and each system has some equipment (such as storage tanks, compressors, pumps, etc.). Therefore, before rectifying the demonstration area, you should first understand the operation and configuration of the equipment to facilitate grouping of tasks in the next step. 　　Task groups can be grouped according to actual conditions, for example: 1. Grouped according to system categories. 　　2. Group according to equipment type. 　　3.Group according to equipment area. 　　Members of each team must be familiar with the equipment in the area they are responsible for to facilitate the subsequent search and analysis of the cause of the failure. 　　Everyone came to "check". After completing the task grouping, they then went to the demonstration area to find out the equipment problems on the spot. So what problems should we look for? Here we have listed six sources that are often seen in chemical plants but are not taken seriously as objects to search and record. The six sources are: 1. Pollution sources refer to dust, oil, waste water, waste gas, harmful substances, noise, radiation, etc. caused by equipment. 　　2. The source of difficulty in cleaning/observation refers to the parts of the equipment that are difficult to clean, or the installation locations of instruments, valves, etc. that are difficult to observe. 　　3. Danger sources refer to places related to equipment that are potentially dangerous and prone to safety accidents. 　　4. Waste sources refer to various types of waste related to equipment, and the categories are as follows: water leakage, air leakage, oil leakage, etc. Waste that runs, pops, drips, or leaks. 　　Equipment is idling, lights are not turned off, air conditioners and hot air are not used, or instruments, spare parts, tools, etc. are wasted. 5. The source of fault refers to the faulty part of the equipment itself, including mechanisms, instruments, circuits, pipelines, insulation layers, valves, couplings, etc. 　　6. Defect sources refer to aspects of existing equipment that cannot meet product quality requirements, such as equipment parameter adjustment, performance, etc. 　　Problem collection, analysis and formulation of preliminary solutions. We classified all the collected problems according to six major sources, and wrote out the problems one by one according to "device name", "occurrence location" and "problem description", and discussed in groups to formulate preliminary solutions. However, in a chemical plant, equipment maintenance must coordinate with production. Therefore, the solutions proposed by the team should be divided into three timings for implementation, namely: 　　1. Can be repaired immediately: repairs can be carried out immediately without shutting down or turning the machine over. 　　2. Maintenance during minor shutdowns: Maintenance can be performed as long as a small area is shut down. 　　3. Maintenance during annual overhaul: Maintenance must be carried out in conjunction with annual overhaul. 　　However, readers are reminded that any small defects should be dealt with as soon as possible, otherwise they may cause serious damage. Therefore, readers must judge based on the actual situation whether the machine should be shut down immediately for repairs. The following table shows the results of the problem summary, the proposed countermeasures, and the rectification progress tracking table. 　　While the 5S activities in the demonstration area are being rectified, the 5S work must also be done well. 5S work in chemical plants usually also includes pipeline rust and corrosion prevention, sorting, rectification and cleaning of spare parts warehouses, and visualization of on-site equipment, pipelines and instruments. 　　Equipment maintenance system discussion: We will discuss the formulation of a maintenance system for various equipment in the demonstration area to see if there is any need to modify or add new ones. The content of the discussion is as follows: 　　1. Daily inspection and maintenance content 2. Weekly inspection and maintenance content 3. Monthly inspection and maintenance content 4. Quarterly inspection and maintenance content 5. Annual inspection and maintenance content Equipment failure phenomenon collection and failure cause analysis Collect equipment failure phenomena in the past three years and conduct cause analysis. The demonstration area team can use Plato to summarize the concentration of problems, and then use brainstorming tools such as fishbone diagrams or 5Why to conduct root cause analysis. Of course, if the data we collect is large enough and detailed, then we suggest that we can apply the statistical techniques in the Six Sigma methodology to do root cause analysis, which will be more scientific. 　　Formulate countermeasures and revise the maintenance system. After the root cause was found, the demonstration area team began to develop countermeasures to prevent recurrence. Note that the emphasis here is on the word "prevention". 　　Based on our experience, many chemical companies are still stuck in the reactive maintenance stage, that is, equipment maintenance is performed only after equipment failure. This makes maintenance personnel in equipment workshops busy fighting fires everywhere, but they never know how to prevent the recurrence of disasters. 　　Therefore, if an enterprise wants to have a good TPM level, it must have the ability to prevent, which is the Total Preventative Maintenance mentioned earlier. 　　In order to ensure that preventive measures are implemented for a long time and form a system and culture, we need to revise these measures into maintenance specifications and train relevant personnel to fully understand the importance of preventive maintenance. 　　Establishing a data collection system In order to enable real-time statistics and analysis of equipment operation, maintenance and six major losses, it is very important to establish a TPM data collection system. However, this part requires the assistance of the company's information department or an external information company. 　　Confirm the TPM indicator. Only after we have complete data can we select the TPM indicator and set goals. Commonly used TPM indicators include: 　　1.OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness): Overall Equipment Effectiveness 2. MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure): Mean Time to Failure 3. MTTB (Mean Time To Repair): Mean Time to Repair Formation system and trial operation establish a complete process from repair report to maintenance record login into TPM data system. 　　After the process is created, it must be trial run. The purpose of the trial run is to understand whether the system process, relevant forms and the TPM data system are feasible. Therefore, it is necessary to ask relevant personnel to provide suggestions during and after the trial run as a basis for revision of the maintenance system. 　　Comprehensively promote TPM. After the rectification of the demonstration area is completed and the relevant TPM system is established and improved, the next step will be to enter the comprehensive implementation stage. 　　The approach to comprehensively promote implementation is to use the demonstration area as a model, with the TPM Promotion Committee and demonstration area seed personnel as the core, to formulate a comprehensive and gradual implementation plan, and to gradually advance and complete the plan one by one in each region. Therefore, if the enterprise is large-scale, it may take 3 to 5 years to complete.