FMEA: Enumerate Failure Modes and Prioritize

FMEA: Failure Modes and Effects Analysis

FMEA is the disciplined act of asking, for each asset function, how it could fail, what would happen, and what we do about it.

Building an FMEA

1. List every function the asset performs.
2. For each function, enumerate the ways it can fail (failure modes).
3. Describe the effect of each failure on production, safety, and quality.
4. Score severity (S), occurrence (O), and detection (D) on a 1-10 scale.
5. Compute the Risk Priority Number: RPN = S x O x D.

Prioritization

• High RPN, high severity — address first; these hurt people or stop the line.
• High occurrence — the failure happens often; investigate root cause, not just the symptom.
• Low detection — you will not see it coming; add monitoring or inspection.

Tips

FMEA is a living document, not a one-time exercise. Update it after every failure and every RCA — the RPNs drift as you learn.