US Army Corps
of Engineers
Construction Engineering
Research Laboratories
Reliability Centered Maintenance
(RCM) Guide
Operating a More Effective Maintenance Program
Alan Chalifoux and Joyce Baird
This manual outlines a comprehensive method
of organizing an efficient maintenance program
by applying the concepts of Reliability Centered
Maintenance (RCM). RCM combines
professional intuition and a rigorous statistical
approach, and recognizes that different
maintenance strategies apply to different facility
equipment: run-to-failure, preventive, predictive,
and proactive maintenance. The RCM approach
applies these differing maintenance strategies in
an optimal mix, to ensure that facility equipment
is maintained sufficient to accomplish the facility
mission without wasting maintenance labor.
This guide is meant to help maintenance
supervisors, managers, and technicians
organize and operate an efficient and effective
maintenance program in an environment of
maintenance budget cutbacks.
Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.
USACERL Technical Report 99/41
April 1999
