Reliability Engineer

DS Smith – Burscough | Full-time | 40 hours per week As our Reliability Engineer, you will play a key role in improving the reliability, availability and performance of our manufacturing assets. You will manage assets throughout their lifecycle, developing effective preventative and predictive maintenance strategies while using data and engineering insight to identify and eliminate recurring failures.

Working closely with Engineering and Operations, you will help maximise equipment availability, reduce downtime, improve safety and quality, and deliver sustainable improvements across the site.

What You’ll Be Responsible For

• Manage the asset care programme across the full equipment lifecycle, including preventative, predictive, corrective and breakdown maintenance, ensuring strategies are aligned to equipment criticality and business priorities.
• Develop and continuously improve preventative and predictive maintenance strategies using OEM recommendations, RCM principles, FMEA/FMECA, PM Optimisation and condition-based monitoring.
• Analyse maintenance and performance data to identify equipment “bad actors”, prioritise opportunities and improve asset availability, reliability and downtime performance.
• Lead Root Cause Analysis and structured problem-solving activity, developing and implementing sustainable solutions to eliminate recurring failures and losses.
• Work closely with the Engineering Planner/Scheduler to ensure maintenance activities are effectively planned, scheduled and delivered, including the management of critical spares, service agreements and the maintenance calendar.
• Support the Engineering team with CAPEX projects, engineering improvements and the implementation of maintenance best practice across the site.
• Work collaboratively with Operations, Corrugator, Conversion, Planning and Despatch teams to understand priorities and ensure engineering activity supports customer and production requirements.
• Develop and report meaningful engineering KPIs, using data to support decision making and focus resources on the highest-priority opportunities.
• Support the Engineering Manager in delivering site objectives and continuously improving engineering standards, processes and ways of working.
• Ensure all engineering activities meet DS Smith’s Health, Safety, Environmental and Quality standards, contributing to a safe, efficient and high-performing manufacturing environment.

What We’re Looking For

• Degree qualified in an Engineering discipline or a time-served engineer with significant relevant manufacturing experience.
• Proven experience in Reliability, Maintenance or Engineering, with a strong understanding of preventative and predictive maintenance.
• Experience using reliability and problem-solving techniques such as FMEA/FMECA, RCA, PM Optimisation and criticality analysis.
• Strong analytical skills with experience using SAP or a similar maintenance management system to analyse data and manage maintenance programmes.
• Experience of condition monitoring techniques such as thermography, vibration monitoring or similar would be advantageous.
• A proactive and collaborative approach, with the ability to influence and work effectively across Engineering, Operations and wider site teams.
• A passion for reliability, continuous improvement and maintenance best practice, with the drive to deliver measurable improvements in safety, quality, cost and performance.