Towards Informed Maintenance Decision Making

Abstract

Advanced maintenance techniques (AMTs) are practices that can help practitioners to make better-informed maintenance decisions, such as ensuring just-in-time maintenance, corporate business planning or lifetime extension of physical assets. These techniques take the current, but preferably also the future, state of assets into account. Although there is much literature on the development of specific techniques, reports on their adoption and use show that only few companies have successfully applied these methods. Guidance is needed on their selection and application. In this chapter, a typology of companies–based on an ongoing multiple-case study–that apply these maintenance techniques is proposed. This typology identifies typical difficulties practitioners experience in applying AMTs. Finally, a four-step procedure is offered with the aim of helping practitioners to overcome the discussed difficulties in the application of AMTs.