Maintenance Planning is necessary for long-term protection of valuable steel structures and pipework assets situated in industrial process plants and marine atmospheres. Petrolatum impregnated and coated tapes represent one of the oldest types of protective maintenance coatings and are well established for use on minimally prepared rusted steel. Developments incorporate a liquid applied reinforced topcoat that quickly sets to form a tough but flexible outer armoring which extends service life and greatly enhances the aesthetic properties of the tape coating. This system would be expected to offer a far longer duration of corrosion protection than conventional liquid coatings applied to hand cleaned steel. Worldwide case studies are described in this paper. Evaluation confirms that petrolatum coatings with suitable outer armourings applied over hand cleaned aged paints and rusted contaminated surfaces are highly cost-effective, retain good long-term appearance and provide totally effective corrosion protection for a longer duration than liquid coatings including many conventional liquid coatings applied to abrasive blasted steel.