A new combined spare parts classification method and a criticality analysis: an iron ore mining company study case.

Spare parts are important to maintain mining operations, which made necessary the development of consolidated classification methods, to help in the decision-making process. The management of spare parts aims to reduce the unnecessary inactivity time arising from the component failures and represent a significant part of the total operational cost. A way to manage the inventory of these materials is its classification. This work presents a new spare parts categorization method based on multi-criteria classification for managing the spare parts inventory using the approaches cut-off point, XYZ, ABCD, Kraljič matrix, Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP), and Bottom-up to categorize in the sectors of production, maintenance, and supply. The study was realized with real data from a mining company composed of 40,002 stored materials, and the results showed an abridgment of the management models. This new categorization contributes to the literature of spare parts inventory management, once there are few studies of practical applications in mining industries besides conducting a literature review regarding relevant criteria and methods used to classify spare parts.