Overview

This chapter discusses the techniques that are most commonly used by maintenance departments to ensure equipment reliability: preventive (PM) and predictive (PDM) maintenance programs. The preventive and predictive maintenance programs increase the availability of the equipment. Even more important, they reduce the amount of reactive work the maintenance department will have to perform. This reduction allows the department to become more proactive and less reactive. The maintenance department can then become more controlled because they will no longer be limited to serving as firefighters.

Beyond the relaxation of pressure on the maintenance department, the results of the first part of the Overall Equipment Effectiveness formula begins to show positive change. The decrease in both breakdowns and the resulting downtime increases the overall equipment effectiveness, producing the following benefits:

• Support for Just In Time (JIT) initiatives

• Support for Total Quality Management (TQM) programs

• Creation of an environment for successful Total Employee

  Involvement (TEI) programs

• Reduction in investment in Capital Equipment Assets (CAE)

• Reduction of maintenance inventory levels

• Increase in corporate profitability

How effective are the preventive and predictive maintenance programs in industry? As shown in Chapter 1, the majority of the companies are not satisfied with their preventive/ predictive maintenance programs. There are many reasons why this is true. The two most common reasons are the lack of management support and the failure to show results.

Reasons PM/ PDM Programs Fail

The lack of management support is the reason why the majority of PM/PDM programs are not successful. This problem...