Root Cause Failure Analysis

Course Overview

This course presents a systematic engineering approach to identifying the underlying causes of rotating equipment failures. It emphasizes the difference between the visible damage, the physical failure mechanism, and the organizational or operating conditions that allowed the failure to occur.

Participants learn how to integrate evidence from vibration data, operating parameters, inspection findings, maintenance history, fracture surfaces, lubrication condition, and numerical analysis. The objective is to develop corrective actions that prevent recurrence rather than simply replace the failed component.

Key Learning Objectives

Participants will learn how to:

Preserve and organize failure evidence
Separate symptoms, mechanisms, and root causes
Develop and evaluate failure hypotheses
Correlate machinery and process information
Select suitable analytical and inspection methods
Develop and verify effective corrective actions

Course Content

Principles and objectives of RCFA
Failure symptoms, mechanisms, and root causes
Immediate, contributing, and systemic causes
Evidence preservation and data collection
Machinery operating and maintenance history
Failure timelines and event reconstruction
Vibration, process, and transient-data correlation
Visual inspection and fracture-surface evidence
Wear, fatigue, corrosion, erosion, and overload
Bearing, shaft, blade, coupling, and seal failures
Five Whys, fishbone diagrams, and fault trees
Hypothesis development and validation
Use of FEM, CFD, and rotordynamic analysis
Human, procedural, and maintenance factors
Corrective and preventive action development
Effectiveness verification and follow-up
Technical reporting and presentation of findings
Industrial failure-analysis case studies

Who Should Attend?

Maintenance and reliability engineers, vibration analysts, rotating equipment specialists, inspection personnel, operations engineers, and professionals responsible for investigating recurring machinery failures.