Overview

There are no solutions, only consequences.

Gilbert G. Jones

Performing preventive maintenance (PM) on an interval basis has long been recognized as a means for improving maintenance effectiveness, and as a means for improving equipment reliability. Hudachek and Dodd ^[1] reported that maintenance costs for rotating machinery using preventive maintenance were over 30% less than those costs incurred from a reactive maintenance approach. In recent years predictive maintenance using condition monitoring equipment has become more and more important to a good PM program, allowing better maintenance planning by considering equipment condition prior to actually performing maintenance work. Not surprisingly, Hudachek and Dodd also state that maintenance costs for rotating machinery using a predictive maintenance approach are nearly half that of reactive maintenance. Numerous other studies depicted in previous chapters, as well as many anecdotes, have provided overwhelming evidence of the benefits of viewing maintenance as a reliability function, as opposed to a repair function, ^[2] and yet most manufacturing plants continue to operate and maintain manufacturing equipment and processes in a predominantly reactive mode. While this is discouraging, there does appear to be a general shift in the acceptance of reliability principles, and considerable effort to improve maintenance practices, and therefore equipment reliability in manufacturing plants. This is certainly true at Beta. This need for improved reliability has also received increased emphasis at many plants with the advent of OSHA 1910, Section 119j, which requires a mechanical integrity program at plants that deal with...