Articles
Insights on engineering, operations and technology
September 2026 · 13 min read
ISO 14224, and building an asset hierarchy that holds up
ISO 14224 gives maintenance data a common structure: nine taxonomy levels, equipment classes with defined boundaries, and standard codes for failures and maintenance. What the standard covers, how to apply it in a CMMS, and what to do about the register you already have.
September 2026 · 13 min read
The maintenance job pack, and what has to be in it
A job pack is everything a crew needs to do a job once, without hunting for it. What goes in one, how a planner builds it, how job plans get reused and improved, and why the pack decides how much of the shift is spent on the tools.
September 2026 · 13 min read
The asset management plan, and the strategy it comes from
An asset management plan says what will be done to a group of assets, when, at what cost and to what level of service. What it contains, how it follows from the strategy above it, what ISO 55001 actually asks for, and how to write one that changes decisions.
September 2026 · 17 min read
FMECA: how to run a failure modes, effects and criticality analysis
FMECA works through how equipment can fail, what each failure does and which failures matter most, so maintenance effort goes where the risk is. The method step by step, how to score criticality, where the risk priority number falls short, and a free worksheet template to start from.
September 2026 · 13 min read
Condition monitoring: techniques, intervals and building a program that works
Condition monitoring finds failures while they are still developing, so the repair can be planned instead of rushed. The main techniques and what each one detects, how to choose between them, how often to check, and how to build a program that pays for itself.
August 2026 · 9 min read
Planner, scheduler, long term planner: three different jobs
The titles get used interchangeably and the roles are not the same. What a planner owns, what a scheduler owns, where the long term view sits, and how the job changes between a routine week and a shutdown.
August 2026 · 6 min read
Digital transformation on a working mine site
The phrase means everything and nothing. What digital transformation looks like when the starting point is a working operation, why the technology is the easy half, and where the value genuinely accrues.
August 2026 · 5 min read
Running an asset criticality assessment that holds up
Most registers carry a criticality column. Fewer can defend how it was set. How consequence and likelihood are actually scored, the workshop that sets them, and what each band should change.
August 2026 · 7 min read
Reliability centred maintenance, and when criticality-led beats it
Reliability centred maintenance is rigorous, defensible and expensive. What RCM analysis involves, how PMO actually compares, and when a criticality-led approach gets you most of the value for a fraction of the work.
August 2026 · 5 min read
What DEM modelling actually tells you about a transfer chute
Discrete Element Method modelling gets talked about like magic. Here is what it genuinely shows you about flow, wear and blockages, what it cannot tell you, and where it earns its keep.
August 2026 · 21 min read
Operational readiness for new assets: methods, standards and the CMMS build
Commissioning proves a new asset can run. Operational readiness proves you can keep running it. The checklist, methods, standards and CMMS build that get a plant, fleet or rail line ready to operate and maintain from handover, and what gets skipped when they are left late.
August 2026 · 4 min read
Master data is boring, until your schedule falls apart
Why messy asset data quietly wrecks planning and scheduling, the symptoms worth measuring, and what a proper clean-up actually involves.
August 2026 · 4 min read
Planning versus break-in: reading your schedule compliance
Schedule compliance and break-in say more about a maintenance organisation than most dashboards. How to read them together, and what the patterns actually mean.
August 2026 · 5 min read
Condition monitoring people actually act on
Plenty of operations collect condition data. Fewer act on it. What separates monitoring that changes decisions from monitoring that just fills a database.
August 2026 · 5 min read
Building software that runs a 24/7 operation
Notes on building applications that operations depend on around the clock, where the interesting design question is not uptime but what the system does when something upstream fails.