Through the word maintenance is meant the “combination of all technical actions, during the life cycle of an entity, that aim to restore a functional condition through which it can execute its work”.

The word “entity” is utilized as a synonym of machinery that refers to the equipment and system through which the maintenance service is addressed.

The goal of the maintenance service is to assure the reliability of the entity, as declared in the UNI EN 13306 ed UNI 9910 “able to accomplish a required function through a specific condition, during a given time”.

In order to pursue a maintenance service, its goals, by offering a competitive price, it is necessary to conceive a balanced maintenance plan in relation to a technical and organizational aspect.

The detection of a balanced maintenance policies is the result of the awareness of the maintenance team and how the work would be structured like.

Afterwards, it is possible to identify all plan requisitions in terms of involved people, organizational asset and expenses.

A maintenance plan is useful to define in which moment is necessary to maintain an equipment with specific actions after a breakdown or contrarily, when it is appropriate to prevent those breakdowns through a specific preventive maintenance.

Hence, the preventive maintenance entails two different strategies: