An overview of contemporary and individualised approaches to production maintenance

In the last number of decades, immense pressure has been put on resources to intensify productivity to sustain the world's growing needs. The evolution of asset maintenance has undergone a myriad of development since its imitation as a management strategy in the early 1940s. Many contemporary strategies have been developed during this time including reliability centred maintenance (RCM) and total productive maintenance (TPM), but in recent decades the growth of individualised maintenance concepts have emerged in order to individualise maintenance with the aim of utilising organisational strengths for increased economic benefit. The benefits and drawbacks of both contemporary and individualised strategies are discussed within the text. It is recognised that available resources to the maintenance sector of an organisation play a vital role in strategy selection. It is suggested that an individualised maintenance strategy built on applicable contemporary ideas and methods would form a tailor-made strategy suitable to the requirements and resources of an organisation.