CIBSE Guide M heralds a new era of maintenance
CIBSE’s revised Guide M on ‘Maintenance engineering and management’ is a major step forward in involving not just facilities managers and maintainers in maintenance issues, but also designers, building owners and operators, and manufacturers. Geoff Prudence, chair of CIBSE’s facilities-management group and author of the chapter providing guidance for building-services designers, said, ‘We are now all in a position, with real data from Guide M and other maintenance guides, to make informed decisions on maintenance strategies and budgets. Chapter 2 of the guide gives real information for designers, so they have no excuses any more not to consider maintenance at the design stage.’
Replacing the previous Guide M of 1998, the new guide was produced in collaboration with BSRIA, B&ES (Building & Engineering Services Association) and RICS (Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors) to allow a common data structure for the presentation of asset information. Economic life data in Guide M is structured by systems and elements, numbered to match RICS’s ‘New rules of measurement 3’ and providing maintenance task references corresponding to B&ES’s SFG20. The section on controls has been rewritten from scratch.
CIBSE’s chief executive Stephen Matthews said, ‘I think that as engineers we have a responsibility no only to design and build buildings but also to make sure that they are operated properly to benefit those people who occupy them.’
Jo Harris of BSRIA and principal author of Guide M (see her article on page 29) spoke about inadequacies at the design stage from her perspective in facilities management: ‘What we as FM professionals want to do is tell our design teams how not to do it wrong. Just engage us a little earlier in the process, and we will talk about things that work for operators — and we will talk whole life, not just operational and capex.’
Speaking as a manufacture, David Fitzpatrick, chair of CIBSE Patrons, said, ‘Manufacturers must promote this document and make everyone aware of it. Maintenance is not just an FM issue, it is an industry issue. This document is a fantastic guide for the industry and will lead to better buildings in the future.’
A contractor’s viewpoint came from Mike McCloskey, a past president of B&ES, ‘This exciting document will take the business of maintenance forward. I urge owners, operators and developers of new buildings to insist on it becoming part of their on-going programme.’
Geoff Prudence sees the next stage in the story of Guide to be getting it embraced not just by CIBSE members but by the industry as a whole.
The guide is available as print and pdf editions.
