Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) and OEE

SEF Reference Guide G02 | Manufacturing OpEx Maturity Assessment

Supports criteria: OB-2 Total Productive Maintenance (TPM)

Glossary terms covered: TPM, OEE

How to use this guide. This is SEF's standard method and the numbers we start from. Every operation is different, so treat the targets, timings, weightings, and templates here as a starting point and adjust them to your products, customers, and risk. Write your version down before you measure against it. Do not apply a tool just to apply a tool. Every method here carries a cost in time, attention, and discipline, and the benefit has to justify that cost in your operation. If it does not, leave it out and say why. A lower score on a criterion you have deliberately chosen not to pursue is an honest score, not a failure. One thing should not change: the maturity level definitions, because they are the scoring basis for the assessment.

What it is

Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) is a way of running equipment so that breakdowns, slowdowns, and defects are designed out rather than repaired after the fact. Operators and maintenance share ownership: operators handle daily cleaning, inspection, lubrication, and tightening, while maintenance focuses on planned work, repairs, and improvements. TPM was developed in Japan by Seiichi Nakajima and the Japan Institute of Plant Maintenance (JIPM). Nippondenso (now Denso), a Toyota supplier, was the first winner of the PM Prize in 1971.

JIPM describes TPM in eight pillars: autonomous maintenance, planned maintenance, focused improvement, quality maintenance, early equipment management, education and training, safety and environment, and TPM in administrative areas. You do not need all eight to start. Most plants begin with loss tracking, planned maintenance, and autonomous maintenance.

Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) is the scorecard. It multiplies Availability, Performance, and Quality to show what share of planned production time was truly productive: making good parts, at full speed, with no stops.

Why it matters

Capacity without capital: raising OEE on a constraint machine adds output without buying equipment (see G11).
Delivery: fewer surprise breakdowns means schedules hold and customers get what was promised.
Quality: worn, dirty, or badly adjusted equipment makes defects. Stable equipment makes stable parts.
Cost: planned work is cheaper than emergency repairs, overtime, and expedited spare parts.
Safety and people: clean, inspected machines with clear standards are safer, and operators gain skill and ownership.

Key terms

Term	Meaning
TPM	Total Productive Maintenance. Operators and maintenance working together, through autonomous maintenance, planned maintenance, and focused improvement, to eliminate breakdowns, defects, and accidents.
OEE	Overall Equipment Effectiveness. Availability x Performance x Quality. The share of planned production time that is truly productive.
Planned production time	Total shift time minus planned breaks and time with no production scheduled.
Availability	Run time divided by planned production time. Captures breakdowns, changeovers, and other stops.
Performance	(Ideal cycle time x total count) divided by run time. Captures slow running and small stops.
Quality	Good count divided by total count. Captures scrap and rework (first-pass good only).
Ideal cycle time	The fastest cycle time the equipment can achieve for that part under ideal conditions (nameplate or demonstrated best).
Six big losses	The common loss categories behind OEE: breakdowns and setups (availability), small stops and reduced speed (performance), and startup rejects and production rejects (quality).
Autonomous maintenance	Routine care done by operators: cleaning, inspection, lubrication, tightening, and simple adjustments. Japanese: jishu hozen.
Planned maintenance	Maintenance scheduled by time, usage, or condition, done before the equipment fails.
CILT	Clean, Inspect, Lubricate, Tighten. The core daily and weekly operator tasks.
MTBF	Mean Time Between Failures. Operating time divided by number of failures. Higher is better.
MTTR	Mean Time To Repair. Total repair time divided by number of repairs. Lower is better.
PM compliance	Planned maintenance tasks completed on time, as a percentage of tasks due.
CMMS	Computerized Maintenance Management System. Software that schedules work orders and stores asset history. A spreadsheet can serve at first.

How to do it

Start recording downtime. Put a simple log at each key machine. Record every stop longer than an agreed threshold (for example, five minutes): start time, end time, reason, and whether it was planned or unplanned. Use a short list of reason codes.
Pick pilot equipment. Start with the constraint or the machine causing the most pain. One machine done well beats ten done badly.
Measure OEE. Use the calculation sheet below for at least two weeks. Agree on ideal cycle times up front and do not change them to make the number look better.
Pareto the losses. Sort losses into the six big losses and rank them by minutes lost. The top one or two become improvement projects (use G05).
Build a TPM schedule for every asset. For each machine, list maintenance tasks, frequency, owner (operator or maintenance), and a checklist. Draw on the manufacturer’s manual and the machine’s failure history.
Launch autonomous maintenance. JIPM’s seven steps are a good guide: (1) initial cleaning and inspection, (2) eliminate contamination sources and hard-to-reach areas, (3) set tentative cleaning, lubrication, and inspection standards, (4) general inspection training, (5) autonomous inspection, (6) standardization, (7) autonomous management. Transfer tasks to operators one at a time, with training and sign-off. Lockout/tagout rules apply to any task inside a guard.
Refocus maintenance. As operators take routine tasks, maintenance time moves to planned work, condition monitoring, spare parts strategy, and fixing chronic failures.
Manage the system. Review OEE, the six big losses, PM compliance, MTBF, and MTTR weekly. Set improvement targets and track actions to closure.

What each maturity level looks like

OB-2 Total Productive Maintenance (TPM)

Level	Assessment wording	What it looks like on the floor	How to move up
1	No equipment downtime information is recorded.	Machines run until they break. Nobody can say how many hours were lost last month or why.	Start a downtime log on the key machines with reason codes.
2	Planned and unplanned maintenance time is recorded.	Downtime logs exist and planned and unplanned time are separated. Maintenance is still mostly reactive.	Use the data to build a TPM schedule with checklists for every asset, starting with the worst.
3	As Level 2, plus all equipment has a TPM schedule with checklists.	Every machine has a maintenance plan and checklists. Maintenance staff do most of the tasks. PM compliance is tracked.	Train operators and transfer routine CILT tasks to them using the seven autonomous maintenance steps.
4	As Level 3, plus operators perform most routine (autonomous) maintenance.	Operators clean, inspect, lubricate, and tighten on a schedule with checklists at the machine. Abnormality tags are raised and closed.	Put a management process around the results: OEE, loss Paretos, targets, and improvement projects reviewed on a set cycle.
5	As Level 4, plus a maintenance management process tracks and continually improves TPM results (for example, OEE).	OEE and loss data are reviewed weekly. Chronic losses have owners and projects. OEE, MTBF, and PM compliance trend up.	Extend to early equipment management and quality maintenance, and share methods across sites.

Evidence to look for

Document

Downtime logs or CMMS records with reason codes, split planned and unplanned.
TPM schedule and checklists for each asset.
Autonomous maintenance checklists at the machines, signed off.
Training records showing which operators are qualified for which AM tasks.

Observation

Are checklists at the machine, current, and filled in by operators?
Are lubrication points, gauges, and inspection points marked (for example, normal ranges on gauges)?
Look for leaks, dirt, missing guards, and open abnormality tags.
Watch a changeover or a stop: is it logged?

Statement

(questions to ask and who to ask)

Operator: “What maintenance do you do on this machine? What do you do when you find a problem?”
Maintenance technician: “How much of your week is planned work versus breakdowns?”
Maintenance manager: “What are your top three losses on the constraint, and what is being done about them?”
Plant manager: “What is OEE on your key equipment, and what is the trend?”

Management report

OEE by machine, with Availability, Performance, and Quality shown separately.
Six big losses Pareto.
PM compliance, MTBF, MTTR, and ratio of planned to unplanned maintenance hours.

Common pitfalls

Gaming OEE. Using a slow “standard” instead of the true ideal cycle time, or excluding changeovers as planned time, inflates the number and hides the losses.
Chasing 85%. Nakajima’s often-quoted world-class figure (about 90% availability, 95% performance, 99% quality, roughly 85% OEE) is a reference, not a target for every machine. Track your own trend.
Comparing OEE across different machines. Different products and processes make cross-machine comparisons misleading. Compare a machine to itself.
Dumping chores on operators. Autonomous maintenance without training, tools, and time is resented and quietly dropped.
A PM schedule nobody follows. Measure PM compliance. A plan at 50% compliance is not a plan.
Collecting data but not acting. If the loss Pareto never produces a project, people stop logging.

Template

OEE Calculation Sheet

(one line per machine per shift; worked example shown)

Field	How to calculate	Example
Machine / shift / date		Press 4, Shift A
Shift length (min)	Scheduled shift time	480
Planned breaks (min)	Breaks, meetings, no-demand time	30
Planned production time (min)	Shift length minus planned breaks	450
Stop time (min)	Breakdowns plus changeovers plus other stops	60
Run time (min)	Planned production time minus stop time	390
Ideal cycle time (min per part)	Fastest achievable cycle	0.5
Total count	All parts made	700
Good count	Parts good first time (no rework)	680
Availability	Run time / planned production time	390 / 450 = 86.7%
Performance	(Ideal cycle time x total count) / run time	350 / 390 = 89.7%
Quality	Good count / total count	680 / 700 = 97.1%
OEE	Availability x Performance x Quality	75.6%
Check	(Good count x ideal cycle time) / planned production time	340 / 450 = 75.6%

Autonomous Maintenance Checklist Header

Machine	Point #	Task (C, I, L, T)	Standard (what good looks like)	Method and tool	Frequency	Time (min)	Owner	Done (initials)

First 30 days

Week 1: Choose the pilot machine. Agree on reason codes and the ideal cycle time. Start the downtime log.
Week 2: Calculate OEE daily. Hold an initial cleaning and inspection with operators and maintenance together, tagging every abnormality.
Week 3: Build the loss Pareto. Draft the TPM schedule and the first operator CILT checklist. Train operators on it.
Week 4: Start the checklist at the machine. Review OEE, losses, and tag closure weekly. Launch one improvement project on the top loss.