Lean Six Sigma in Maintenance & Facilities

Lean Six Sigma in Maintenance & Facilities: Why It Matters

Poorly planned work orders, long waits for parts, and chronic equipment failures drain uptime and budget. Lean hunts wasted motion and queue time; Six Sigma hunts variation and repeat failures.

Downtime ↓ 40 % in six months after predictive-maintenance DMAIC. – LinkedIn
OEE ↑ 18 points (50 % → 68 %) at a petro-chemical pump station. – KKG Publications
MTTR ↓ 100 min (110 min → 10 min) on mining-equipment motors. – Mercu Buana Publications
Repair cycle time ↓ 36 % and 39-day cut at a U.S. Army depot. – ieworldconference.org

Lean Tools Every Maintenance Team Can Use

5S the parts crib — clear labels, fixed locations, zero search time.
Value-stream map work-order flow — expose waits between request, approval, and execution.
Kanban for spare-parts levels — visual reorder points stop stock-outs.
Obeya wall — one screen for MTBF, MTTR, backlog, and today’s blockers.

Six Sigma Methods for Maintenance Metrics

Metric	Track	Why It Helps
Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE)	Availability × Performance × Quality	One-number health check
Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF)	Operating hours ÷ failures	Predicts asset reliability
Mean Time to Repair (MTTR)	Downtime ÷ repairs	Shows maintenance speed
Planned-vs-unplanned work	% tasks planned	Higher planned % means fewer surprises

DMAIC gives each metric a roadmap from baseline → root cause → improve → control.

Lean Six Sigma in Maintenance & Facilities: Quick Wins & Real Stats

Condition-monitoring sensors + Kanban parts kits removed 40 % of unplanned downtime.
5S + TPM checks pushed OEE from 50 % to 68 %.
Root-cause blitz on starter-motor failures shrank MTTR 110 → 10 min (-91 %).
DMAIC overhaul line cuts repair cycle 36 %, saving $956 k a year.

Lean Six Sigma in Maintenance & Facilities: Step-by-Step Start-Up

Pick one pain point — MTTR or downtime is easy to measure.
Map the current flow — every request, wait, and part pickup.
Label steps as value-add, required, or waste; remove pure waste.
Baseline the numbers — hours, %, $, sigma level.
Analyze causes — 5 Whys, Pareto, FMEA.
Pilot fixes — one asset class or one building.
Control — SOPs, dashboards, weekly audits.

Wrap-Up

Lean Six Sigma in Maintenance & Facilities means fewer breakdowns, faster repairs, and higher asset productivity. Start with one metric, remove waste, reduce variation, lock the gain, repeat.