Cooperation between customer and supplier - a key to development

Smart Maintenance is an organizational design for maintenance in a digitalized industry, and consists of 4 key principles:

1. Data-driven decisions, ie. make decisions based on data
2. Collective competence that stands for broader competence within the maintenance organization
3. Internal integration, ie. cooperation within the company
4. External integration, ie. collaboration with others outside the company. How SKF works with lubrication management together with it's customers is a good example of how to strengthen the external integration between customer and supplier.

SKF has made an analysis of 942 failed bearings globally. There it could be stated that only 2% goes to fatigue, while 36% of these were directly caused by incorrect lubrication. A further 18% was related to contaminants, which also often has to do with lack of lubrication maintenance.

If we are to help our customers increase their availability and contribute to sustainability and competitiveness, then we must work with lubrication maintenance from a holistic perspective.

SKF has long worked with lubrication recommendations and technology for automated lubrication maintenance. However, this has not been enough to reduce bearing failures caused by inadequate lubrication maintenance. For the past 1.5 years, SKF has thus taken a holistic approach to lubrication maintenance, with the aim of creating awareness and knowledge of how lubrication maintenance affects the entire production system, as well as helping customers with improvement activities. The process begins with a current situation analysis that includes 10 different perspectives, such as lubricant selection, purchasing process, handling from storage to lubrication point, degree of automation and landfill and last but not least, competence development. The current situation analysis is done in the form of interviews with key people from various functions in the factory, such as maintenance manager, performer of lubrication maintenance, production manager, environmental manager, purchasing manager and also HR staff. The current situation can then be compared with a benchmark, based on SKF's customers globally, which is a very effective way for the customer to understand what is good and what development opportunities and areas for improvement exist.

We have done analyzes globally so we have a benchmark to start from where we can compare industries and companies. It will then be easier for customers to compare and adapt to better working methods where there is a need. Furthermore, we can then consider how such a working method would affect them financially, environmentally and safety-wise.

The next step is to identify improvement measures. Many improvement measures can have a great effect without large investments. This could be, for example, buying a slightly more expensive lubricant adapted for the purpose, or moving a lubrication point outside the machine for increased safety.

Health and safety in particular are usually areas for listing. Safety shortcomings become very clear when doing tours - especially managers and leaders get to see how things really go. It can e.g. be that certain lubrication points are close to rotating equipment, or that they are difficult to access and require stepping on machines. It is not safe - but often relatively easy to solve if you are aware of the problem. The current situation analysis is very valuable in creating awareness.

SKF also offers help with the implementation of improvement measures - everything from technical solutions to training. Education and competence is something Johan emphasizes several times. It happens as much in lubrication technology as in other technology development. Thus, maintenance personnel need to continuously update their knowledge - even in lubrication maintenance.

When asked what insights their customers have gained through this current situation analysis, Johan answers that the great value lies in awareness. Some may be happy to change their bearings every 6 years - but if you can get bearings to last 30 years with the right lubrication, are you just as happy then? It is only when you become aware of what you are doing, good or bad, that you can begin to question the current approach and develop. Furthermore, competence development is needed.

Education helps with realizing that there are always things to develop.

And SKF also learns from this trip. By visiting their customers, they get a continuous update of their benchmark, and they get new insights that they can pass on to the next customer.

This is a collaboration between the performers of the analysis and those who are analyzed [eg. SKF and customer] to bring about improvement. It should not be the feeling of an audit - it should be the feeling of doing it together. Everyone in the team should contribute their opinion on where we want to bring the improvement.

The article is written by Camilla Lundgren based on an interview with Johan Larsson at SKF.