Title: Optimal burn-in time and imperfect maintenance strategy for a warranted product with bathtub shaped failure rate

Authors: Mahmood Shafiee; Ezzatollah Asgharizadeh

Addresses: Department of Industrial Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Tarbiat Modares University, P.O. Box 14115-179, Tehran, Iran. ' Department of Industrial Management, University of Tehran, P.O. Box 14155-6311, Tehran, Iran

Abstract: |Burn-in/preventive maintenance| programme is an efficient approach used to minimise the warranty servicing cost of a product with bathtub shaped failure rate. Burn-in is a widely used method to improve the quality of product during its |infant mortality| period and preventive maintenance is a scheduled necessary activity carried out during its |wear-out| period. In this paper, an optimisation model is developed to determine the optimal burn-in time and optimal imperfect preventive maintenance strategy that minimises the total mean servicing cost of a warranted product with an age-dependent repair cost. We provide a numerical study to illustrate our results.

Keywords: bathtub curve; reliability engineering; failure rates; burn-in times; preventive maintenance; minimal repairs; servicing costs; imperfect strategies; warranted products; warranty servicing; warranties; maintenance strategies; product quality; infant mortality failures; scheduled activities; necessary activities; wear-out periods; optimisation models; cost minimisation; age-dependent repairs; repair costs; collaborative enterprises; collaboration; maintenance modelling; maintenance management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCENT.2011.043825

International Journal of Collaborative Enterprise, 2011 Vol.2 No.4, pp.263 - 274

Published online: 23 Nov 2011 *

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