What is Preventive Maintenance (PM)

The optimization of the maintenance decision making can be defined as an attempt to resolve the conflicts of decision situation in such a way that variable under the control of the decision maker take their best possible value. One of the most important controllable parameters is the time interval between maintenance. Most of the researchers have kept the fact that whenever the suitable maintenance interval is reached, the system is replaced with the original one. However the improvement of a system life not only depends on the replacement of deteriorated components, but also on the effectiveness of the maintenance. Taking care about this fact, the effects of maintenance of a multi-component system by combining the three main different PM actions, namely (1a), (1b) and (2p)-maintenance actions. Thus, the main purpose of an effective maintenance program is to present a technique for finding the optimal maintenance interval for the system by considering the multiple goals of the organization viz. maximum availability, minimum maintenance cost.