We are seeking a Reliability Maintenance Engineer to join our Maintenance team and help drive equipment reliability, optimize maintenance strategies, and support safe, efficient operations.
Reporting to the Mechanical Maintenance Superintendent, the Reliability Maintenance Engineer is the technical authority for equipment reliability across the mill, leading the development and execution of reliability-centered maintenance strategies that shift the organization from reactive to proactive asset management.
The Reliability Maintenance Engineer owns the predictive maintenance program, leads root cause failure analysis, develops condition monitoring strategies for critical assets, and provides the data-driven insights that guide maintenance investment decisions. The successful candidate will work at the intersection of engineering analysis, field-level diagnostics, and maintenance planning to drive measurable improvements in equipment availability and total cost of ownership.
Key Responsibilities:
Predictive and Preventive Maintenance Strategy
- Predictive maintenance program ownership: Develop, implement, and continuously improve condition monitoring programs including vibration analysis, oil analysis, infrared thermography, ultrasound, and motor current analysis across all critical and semi-critical rotating and electrical equipment.
- Preventive maintenance optimization: Analyze equipment failure data, PM task effectiveness, and condition monitoring trends to optimize PM intervals and task content. Eliminate non-value-added PM tasks and introduce condition-based alternatives where supported by data.
- Technology evaluation and integration: Assess emerging reliability technologies and recommend adoption where cost-benefit analysis supports implementation. Lead pilot programs for new condition monitoring tools and techniques.
Establish and maintain equipment condition baselines for A-critical and B-critical assets, with defined alarm and action thresholds for all monitored parameters.
-
Develop and maintain PdM route schedules, ensuring coverage aligns with asset criticality rankings.
-
Root Cause Analysis and Failure Elimination
- Root Cause Problem Elimination (RCPE): Lead formal root cause failure analysis investigations for significant equipment failures, chronic repeaters, and production loss events. Facilitate cross-functional investigation teams and drive corrective actions to completion.
- Failure data analysis: Analyze equipment failure history, maintenance cost trends, and production delay data to identify patterns, prioritize improvement initiatives, and quantify the business case for reliability investments.
Develop and maintain a loss elimination tracking system that connects failure events to corrective actions, completion status, and validated results.
-
Provide technical input to Loss of Production Reports (LOPRs) as required.
-
Equipment Reliability and Asset Strategy
- Equipment criticality assessments: Lead or participate in asset criticality ranking exercises to ensure maintenance resources are allocated proportionally to equipment importance.
- Reliability-centered maintenance (RCM): Apply RCM methodology to develop and refine maintenance strategies for critical equipment, ensuring the right balance of preventive, predictive, and corrective maintenance tasks.
- Precision maintenance standards: Champion precision maintenance practices including shaft alignment, balancing, bearing installation, lubrication management, and fastener torque specifications. Audit compliance and coach trades on precision standards.
Evaluate repair vs. replace vs. upgrade options for aging or underperforming assets, providing engineering analysis and lifecycle cost comparisons to support capital and major maintenance decisions.
-
Technical Support and Troubleshooting
- Operational event support: Provide engineering support for equipment failures and operational events. Diagnose root causes in the field and recommend immediate corrective actions to restore production capability.
Support maintenance supervisors and tradespeople with technical guidance on complex repairs, rebuilds, and equipment modifications.
-
Participate in reviews for complex maintenance jobs, providing reliability perspective on planned approaches and identifying potential failure risks.
-
Review and approve maintenance procedures and specifications for critical equipment from a reliability engineering perspective.
-
Programs, Audits, and Continuous Improvement
- Program audits: Conduct periodic audits of preventive maintenance, lubrication and condition monitoring programs to assess compliance, effectiveness.
Highlight when PM execution performance is below expectations, provide constructive feedback to maintenance supervision, and work collaboratively to optimize program content and compliance.
-
Support annual shutdown and major maintenance activities with equipment condition assessments, scope recommendations, and post-outage performance validation.
-
Participate in design review, value engineering, and construction document development for facility modifications and new installations to ensure reliability and maintainability are embedded in design.
-
Data Management, Reporting, and Communication
Maintain reliability databases and dashboards that track key equipment health indicators, PdM findings, failure trends, and reliability KPIs (MTBF, MTTR, planned vs. unplanned ratios, PM compliance).
-
Produce regular reliability reports for translating technical findings into actionable recommendations.
-
Present reliability findings, root cause analyses, and program updates to maintenance leadership and cross-functional teams.
-
Compensation & Benefits
As a valued member of the Howe Sound team, you will be rewarded with a competitive annual salary, bonus plan, eligibility for overtime, relocation assistance, a comprehensive retirement savings plan, and extended Health and Dental benefits package. In addition to a competitive total rewards program, you'll have the opportunity to work alongside a collaborative team in a dynamic manufacturing environment that values safety, continuous improvement, and professional growth.
Salary information: $95,000 - $115,000 CAD per year.
Domtar is firmly committed to placing greater emphasis on the principles of equity, diversity and inclusion to empower all employees to reach their full potential. We form a dynamic team whose diverse backgrounds and wealth of perspectives are one of the keys to our success. We offer an inclusive, rewarding and safe work environment with opportunities that will help grow your skills.
To learn more about our company, consult the Domtar Company Web Site and follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram and Twitter.
