Why: Maximizing equipment uptime with lower costs by all employees working to reducing the many small incidents which lead to a failure

When: Major maintenance tasks are handled by the craftsmen. Most small tasks are handled by operators in a never ending effort of cleaning, lubricating, and tightening to find problems early when they can be solved simply instead of letting the problem grow to a major issue.

Where: TPM is a system wide effort of providing care to the equipment rather than "it's not my job" and "we've got to fill out the paperwork before "they" can do anything". The technique makes good use of the 5 human senses but technical details must be taught to the work force to understand good from bad and when action must be taken along with what must be done-this requires a sharing environment where the work team works for the common good of higher performance. If the culture is me, me, me, TPM will not work.

These definitions are written by H. Paul Barringer and are also posted on his web site at www.barringer1.com

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