Equifactor® is TapRooT®’s framework for troubleshooting and proving equipment failures. Expert-guided troubleshooting ensures standardized practices to attack both repeat and unique machine and system issues.

What is Equifactor® and what will it do for your organization?

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Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting & TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis

Prevent downtime and save money by using true first-time fixes that eliminate repeat equipment failures.
Process

Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting & TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis is a systematic process to find and fix the root causes of equipment failures.

  • Collect, understand, and organize evidence about what happened. The TapRooT® tool, the SnapCharT® diagram, reduces investigator bias and makes the facts make sense without developing hypotheses.
  • Troubleshoot equipment failure and add evidence to SnapCharT®.
  • Identify all the Causal Factors (the human errors or equipment failures) that led to the problem – the starting point for root cause analysis.
  • Use expert guidance to analyze human errors using the Human Performance Troubleshooting Guide and equipment failures using the Equifactor® Troubleshooting Tables.
  • Analyze the real root causes of problems guided by the Root Cause Tree® Diagram and Dictionary.
  • Develop effective fixes for problems using the Corrective Action Helper® Guide and Safeguard Analysis to stop repeat incidents or significantly reduce their consequences.

More TapRooT® System Info

Software

The patented TapRooT® Software is a cloud-based, user-friendly, root cause analysis tool that can be accessed with a browser on a wide variety of devices – laptops (PC or Mac), tablets, or even phones – and provides a central repository for an incident investigation data. The TapRooT® Software can be licensed for hosting on your cloud, we can provide hosting, or individuals can create accounts on our TapRooT® Software cloud site. TapRooT® Users will find that the software guides the investigator through the systematic process with ease. TapRooT® Software includes:

  • All of the essential TapRooT® techniques: SnapCharT®, the Root Cause Tree® and Dictionary, Safeguard Analysis, and the Corrective Action Helper® Guide.
  • The optional TapRooT® techniques: Equifactor®, Critical Human Action Profile (CHAP), and Change Analysis.
  • Customizable reports that the investigator can use to confidently provide presentations or written management reports.
  • The ability to trend incident and root cause data.
  • Tracking of corrective actions.
  • A lessons-learned module.

More TapRooT® Software Info

Training

In the 2-Day Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis Course, you learn how to use Equifactor® Troubleshooting Tables to fix equipment failures and go beyond troubleshooting to find the real, fixable root causes of failures.

2-Day Course Description

This course can be shortened to one day to teach just the troubleshooting techniques to technicians who will apply them every day in the field.

1-Day Course Description

How Does Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis Work? Click through the descriptions below...

Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting is the framework within TapRooT® to prove equipment failure mechanisms. Expert-guided troubleshooting ensures standardized practices to attack both repeat and unique machine, system, and process failures. Developed in partnership with the late Heinz Bloch, Equifactor® is a professional troubleshooting system for equipment experts to prove what component, process, or machine failure mechanism(s) occurred.

Standard equipment troubleshooting tables help novices and experts step through a troubleshooting checklist without wasting time brainstorming. Read about the Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting Process.

Equifactor®’s Failure Modes and Failure Agents module guides investigators and troubleshooters to deduce unknown failure mechanisms without pre-built tables.  When there’s no smoking gun, prove the failure modes and failure agents by working out the recipe for equipment problems.

All TapRooT® and Equifactor® users can quickly build proprietary Equifactor® tables for in-house use with the custom table importing. Custom tables are your organization’s best resource for capturing your equipment expert’s experience, knowledge, and technical skill. Use your custom tables to train new technicians, propagate lessons learned, and effectively operationalize organizational learning. Read “7 Ways Custom Equifactor Tables Will Help You.”

This technique is used to find and fix problems associated with equipment failures.

Step 1: Find out what happened.

You must find out what happened before you can find out why it happened. This step helps investigators collect, organize, and analyze what happened.

Tools SnapCharT®

Step 2: Troubleshoot equipment failure and add evidence to SnapCharT®.

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Tools Equifactor® Troubleshooting Tables

Step 3: Decide if there is more to learn.

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Tools Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting Tables

Step 4: Find Causal Factors using Safeguard Analysis.

Dig more deeply and use Safeguard Analysis to pinpoint all the human errors and equipment failures that contributed to the incident.

Tools Safeguard Analysis

Step 5: Find root causes using the Root Cause Tree®.

Each Causal Factor is analyzed to find its root causes. Note that incidents almost always have multiple Causal Factors and root causes.

Tools Root Cause Tree®, Root Cause Tree® Dictionary

Step 6: Develop fixes.

Fixes (corrective actions) are developed and implemented using an expert system – the Corrective Action Helper® Guide/Module.

Tools Corrective Action Helper® Guide/Module

Step 7: Repair equipment.

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What are Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis all about? Schedule a meeting with Equifactor® Director and TapRooT® Instructor Justin Clark to find out!

Schedule a Meeting with Justin

Pittsburgh
Learn About Our Software

Find out more about our patented cloud-based root cause analysis software.

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Buy the Book

Read about Equifactor® Troubleshooting Tools and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis to improve equipment reliability.

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Equifactor® Training

Attend a public Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting Course.

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Blog Post
Recent Blog Posts

Read blog posts with great tips about improving equipment reliability.

Go to Equipment Reliability / Equifactor® Posts
Sign up for the FREE Equipment Reliability Network™ Newsletter

Stop repeat failures. Learn about how human factors contribute to equipment problems. Delivered to your inbox once each month.

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Success Stories
How Can Equifactor® Help You?

Learn how one company saved $40 million after implementing TapRooT® on our Equipment Reliability Page.

Equipment Reliability Webpage

Why Do Industry Leaders Recommend Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis?

Design and Testing

Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis are:

  • A systematic process based on over 30 years of in-depth equipment reliability and human factors research.
  • Designed to keep you out of common investigation traps including the blame game and jumping to conclusions.
  • Tested by government agencies and industry leaders around the world, and continuously improved to produce reliable, repeatable, explainable results.

Features and Continuous Improvement

Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis have:

  • Not just a root cause analysis system, but a complete investigation process that helps investigators collect the information they need to find root causes and develop effective corrective actions.
  • An expert system that leads investigators beyond their current knowledge, and makes them feel like they have a human factors expert sitting beside them when analyzing human errors.
  • The patented TapRooT® Software (either Hosted or On-Premise) can make the system more efficient, and to allow sharing and trending of investigation results.
  • Targeted training for those investigating precursor (simple) incidents, equipment failures, or major accidents.
  • Our expert staff developed the copyrighted, proprietary Root Cause Tree®, Dictionary, and Corrective Action Helper® Guide. They have been continuously improved for over 30 years.
  • The TapRooT® Advisory Board of over 60 industry and governmental leaders from around the world to provide improvement ideas and critique planned improvements.
  • Equifactor® troubleshooting tables designed by equipment expert Heinz Bloch.
  • Extensive, readable documentation. The best-selling TapRooT® series of books have sold well over 100,000 copies worldwide.

Worldwide Support

Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis offer:

  • A worldwide network of experienced instructors/facilitators with extensive real-world experience. This helps them answer tough questions in Equifactor® Courses and provide expert assistance when facilitating difficult investigations.
  • A global user network and a discussion site on LinkedIn. With over 10,000 people per year being trained to use TapRooT®, you can be assured that there is someone who has faced challenges similar to yours and solved them using Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis.
  • A free, monthly eNewsletter to promote continued learning of advanced root cause analysis, equipment troubleshooting, and performance improvement.
  • A YouTube video channel where users can learn the latest root cause and investigation tips.
  • An annual, Global TapRooT® Summit to promote networking, benchmarking, and learning of advanced best practices and the most recent performance improvement technology.

Guarantee

You know we believe in what we offer because we provide this guarantee:

Attend Equifactor® Equipment Troubleshooting and TapRooT® Root Cause Analysis Training. Go back to work and apply what you have learned to investigate incidents, accidents, quality problems, or other issues. If you don’t find root causes that you previously would have overlooked and if you AND your management team don’t agree that the corrective actions you recommend are much more effective, just return your course materials and we will refund the entire course fee.

With a guarantee that is straightforward, you can be assured that you won’t be wasting your time.

Learn About TapRooT® Training

TapRooT® offers a wide range of training to support incident investigators, including root cause analysis, equipment troubleshooting, evidence collection and interviewing, trending, and proactive use of TapRooT® (auditing).

Learn More

We can help you develop a road map to root cause analysis success.

Scheduling an Executive Briefing is the first step to improving your company’s root cause analysis. Visit our Executive Portal to learn more.

Executive Portal