Reliability, Availability and Maintainability (RAM) Study can be applied within many of the phases in the lifecycle of an asset. When applied in the design phase it will give an indication of what performance to expect from your assets. That is:
- What down time will be applied due to planned maintenance – availability and maintainability
- If certain critical breakdowns occur, how well prepared are your organization to fix it and have spare part readily available – maintainability and reliability
- The designed maintenance strategy, what theoretical confidence level and probability of optimal operation does your organization has to it – reliability
In many cases an RCM/FMECA approach will be valuable to apply to this study. In theory if every aspects of your assets are covered by the FMECA and the maintenance strategy executed to perfection, your reliability score would be 100%. In many industries this is close to impossible. The FMECA will however be the best tool to indicate the expected maintenance strategy (availability), theoretical probability of failure (reliability, some failure modes cannot be mitigated) and what does it take execute the maintenance, i.e. tool time, manpower, spare parts, lead time etc. (maintainability).
The RAM Study can also be applied to assess existing maintenance environments and point out key subject for your organization to address in order to optimize your availability, reliability and maintainability of your assets.