The belief that generic maintenance policies can and should
be applied to most types of assets lies at the heart of nearly
all traditional maintenance programs. For instance, how
often does one hear people say things like "the maintenance
policy which we apply to all our pumps is X" or "we have
a type Y calibration policy for all our instruments"?
However, the correct use of techniques like RCM2 to
develop maintenance programs quickly shows why the inappropriate use of generic maintenance is one of the main
reasons why so many traditional programs do not achieve
their full potential. The main reasons are as follows: