FMEA tool for lifeboat release gear
MUN’s Safety and Risk Engineering (SRE) group is an international research team in the area of fault diagnosis, failure analysis and risk assessment, working mainly in the offshore oil and gas and process industries. Dr Fiasal Khan heads the team that is working closely with Mad Rock develop the tool.
Mad Rock’s first product to undergo FMEA (failure mode effect analysis) was its second-generation RocLoc lifeboat hook system. The project had the aim of developing an FMEA tool that could be applied to any type of lifeboat hook as well as improving the RocLoc system design. The SRE team considered 42 components of the RocLoc system, incorporating the company’s design experience, its training programmes, the current SOLAS and LSA Codes and proposed future regulations.
FMEA identifies potential failure modes within engineered systems based on past experience. Failure modes are any errors or defects in a process, design, or item, especially those that can affect the customer, and can be potential or actual. Effects analysis refers to studying the consequences of those failures. FMEA is a well-used procedure in product development and operations management which enables the user to design failures out of the system.
“The International Maritime Organization (IMO) has been considering making FMEA a required analysis for the approval of advanced lifeboat release hooks” said Khan. “Our collaboration with Mad Rock will aim to do a detailed risk assessment of Mad Rock RocLoc hook, and in doing so, develop a formal rigorous FMEA tool that Mad Rock can use on any type of lifeboat release gear and other hook products”
Dean Pelley, CEO and president of Mad Rock, added: “We are excited about this collaboration with Dr Khan’s group and the potential to have a formal tool that we can use to evaluate the RocLoc and other future products that drive our goal to improve safety standards, performance, and usability”.
