RCM was developed in the Civil Aviation Industry and has been applied universally in that industry for decades. It has been instrumental in the dramatic improvements in reliability – which includes safety – in civil aviation, alongside a real reduction in maintenance costs.
RCM can be applied to any asset or process in any industry. If applied properly to problematic or critical assets, and the results implemented, it can deliver remarkable improvements.
This page gives some examples of the success of the process through some videos. The first describes the results in Civil Aviation, while four other videos – case studies 2 to 5 – describe the success of the process in two completely different applications, in other industries. These examples have been selected because they contain a variety of findings and a variety of benefits. While each situation is different, hopefully at least one of them will give an indication of how RCM can help you improve the reliability or one of your assets or processes.
The first two are separate case studies that won awards. The first and third are interesting because the recommendations involved challenging and moving away from manufacturers recommendations and/or traditional thinking. The second case study is an interesting example of how RCM makes things better by series of small improvements – one failure mode at a time. The second case study is also a good example of how reliability is not just about maintenance. The third case study is a good example of how RCM can be applied to different types of equipment – in this case instruments.
Case study 5 provides further examples of how reliability is not just about maintenance. Improvements were identified improvements by looking beyond the equipment – at the process around it and is a particularly good examples of how human factors can have a big – sometimes the dominant – impact on reliability.
All of these case studies have common factors – the proper application of the RCM process, the implementation of the results (this does not happen automatically!), good information from a team of people that know the asset best, and a consideration of business benefits before, during and after the analysis.
Please note that all of these case studies have been sanitised to some extent.
The client resources section of the website provides many more case study videos.