SMRP BoK Review Workbook

Pillar 5: Work Management

Asset Hierarchy

Equipment and the classification of it forms the basis of Reliability,
Maintainability, Availability analyses. The first step is to define the hierarchy.

It establishes the parent child relationship with the equipment, systems and
operations.

The goal here is to
systematically
classify items into
generic groups
based on factors
possibly common
to several items,
such as (location,
process, use, etc.).
Using the ISO
14224 template
we can see:

▪ Level 1 industry (Steel)

▪ Level 2 Business Category (Stamping Corp)

▪ Level 3 Installation Category (Somewhere Plant)

▪ Level 4 Plant Type (Raw Materials)

▪ Level 5 Section / System (Crane)

▪ Level 6 Equipment (Trolley)

▪ Level 7 Subunit (Gearbox)

▪ Level 8 Maintainable item. (Bearing)

▪ Level 9 Part

Level 1 – 5 represent high level categorization, while 6-9 are related
specifically to equipment.

This allows the reliability & cost information to roll up providing a clear view

of how the site is operating. It also allows common equipment types to be

grouped together for various analysis, such as bad actors, comparing MTBF,

etc. across a site or an entire business.

It is important that a properly defined Hierarchy is established and followed.

This ensure the integrity of the data and facilitates meaningful analysis.

ISO 14224, is an excellent resource for further information in this category.

Asset Criticality

Criticality is a measure of importance of an equipment relative to other pieces

of equipment. Equipment criticality is used to assist with decision making.

Criticality is based on the potential risk and consequences of a failure to the

operation.

The risk and consequence could be:

▪ Safety: in Which there could be a bodily injury or death

▪ Environmental: in which a there could be a breach in any level of

government law or regulation which applies to the physical asset or

system

▪ Operational: in which a failure impacts the operational capability of

the asset or system.

▪ Hidden: in which a failure would not be evident to the operating crew

under normal conditions. These types of failure are evident in

accidents such as Chernobyl, Gulf Oil Spill, etc.

▪ Non-operation risk: in which a failure would not affect, safety,

environmental, operational and just requires the repair or

replacement of any item.

Typically, the criticality of the equipment is determined by a cross functional

group within the organization, taking into account all aspects if a piece of