Last night I attended the Asset Management Council meeting in Melbourne, Australia. At the meeting I made a presentation titled Materials Management, The Missing Link in Reliability. During the presentation I show some photos of storerooms where it is clear that the spares being stored either are not properly maintained or could not be maintained due to the way they are stored. In some cases the storage technique actually adds to the degradation. What surprised me though was the number of people who said afterwards 'that looked like our warehouse'!
I know that the photos were not of any of their warehouses but they all recognized the situation. So what is going on here? We recognize the condition, understand the negative impact but do nothing about it. Why do we put up with this? Surely, if we are serious about materials and spare parts management and reliability we would act to ensure that our spares are fit for purpose when required.
