Marginal cost analysis of single-item maintenance policies with several decision variables

The marginal cost approach for the analysis of repair/replacementmodels was introduced by Berg in 1980 and has since been appliedto many maintenance policies of various complexity. All modelshitherto analysed in the literature by the marginal cost approachhave one single decision variable only, this being, typically,the age of the current item at the time of ordering or replacement.This paper is concerned with the extension of the marginal costtechnique to maintenance policies with several decision variables.After addressing the general framework appropriate for the multi-parametercase, we exemplify the workings of the technique by analysinga two-variable maintenance model involving replacement and minimalrepair. We demonstrate that the marginal cost approach is anattractive and intuitively appealing technique also for modelswith several decision variables. Just as in the single-parametersituation, the approach is amenable to economic interpretation,a welcome feature for users of maintenance models with a primeinterest in its economic (rather than its mathematical) aspects.As an added bonus of the marginal cost approach, in our example,some otherwise necessary tools from the theory of stochasticprocesses are dispensable.     

Efficiency consideration of generalized age replacement policy

Under the generalized age replacement policy, the system is replaced either at the predetermined age or upon failure if its corresponding repair time exceeds the threshold, whichever comes first. In this paper, we investigate the optimal choice of the pre‐determined preventive replacement age for a nonwarranted system, which minimizes the expected cost rate during the life cycle of the system from the customer's perspective under certain cost structures. Furthermore, we discuss several properties of such a generalized age replacement policy in comparison with the traditional age replacement policy. An efficiency, which represents the fractional time that the system is on, is defined under the proposed generalized age replacement policy and its monotonicity properties are investigated as well. The main objective of this study is to investigate the advantageous features of the generalized age replacement policy over the traditional age replacement policy with regard to the availability of the repairable system. Assuming that the system deteriorates with age, we illustrate our proposed optimal policies numerically and observe the impact of relevant parameters on the optimal preventive replacement age.     

A generalized discrete-time order replacement model

In this article, we consider a discrete-time order replacementproblem. More precisely, we treat a generalized model with morecomplex cost structure than Kaio & Osaki (1979, IEEE Trans.Reliab., R-29, 405–406) and with two decision variables:allowable inventory time and ordering time. Based on the discreteprobabilistic argument, we derive the optimal ordering policyto deliver a spare unit preventively by a regular order, soas to minimize the expected cost per unit time in the steadystate. Numerical examples are devoted to carrying out the sensitivityanalysis of model parameters on the optimal ordering policyand its associated expected cost value.     

Optimal maintenance strategy for non‐renewing replacement–repair warranty

In this paper, we study the maintenance policy following the expiration of the non‐renewing replacement–repair warranty (NRRW). For such purposes, we first define the non‐renewing free replacement–repair warranty and the non‐renewing pro rata replacement–repair warranty. Then the maintenance model following the expiration of the NRRW is discussed from the user's point of view. As the criterion to determine the optimal maintenance strategy, we formulate the expected cost rate per unit time from the user's perspective. All system maintenance costs incurred after the warranty is expired are paid by the user. Given the cost structures during the life cycle of the system, we determine the optimal maintenance period following the expiration of the NRRW. Finally, a few numerical examples are given for illustrative purposes. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A replacement model for an additive damage model with restoration

A system existing in a random environment receives shocks at random points of time. Each shock causes a random amount of damage which accumulates over time. A breakdown can occur only upon the occurrence of a shock according to a known failure probability function. Upon failure the system is replaced by a new identical one with a given cost. When the system is replaced before failure, a smaller cost is incurred. Thus, there is an incentive to attempt to replace the system before failure. The damage process is controlled by means of a maintenance policy which causes the accumulated damage to decrease at a known restoration rate. We introduce sufficient conditions under which an optimal replacement policy which minimizes the total expected discounted cost is a control limit policy. The relationship between the undiscounted case and the discounted case is examined. Finally, an example is given illustrating computational procedures.     

A sequential condition‐based repair/replacement policy with non‐periodic inspections for a system subject to continuous wear

This paper studies a condition‐based maintenance policy for a repairable system subject to a continuous‐state gradual deterioration monitored by sequential non‐periodic inspections. The system can be maintained using different maintenance operations (partial repair, as good as new replacement) with different effects (on the system state), costs and durations. A parametric decision framework (multi‐threshold policy) is proposed to choose sequentially the best maintenance actions and to schedule the future inspections, using the on‐line monitoring information on the system deterioration level gained from the current inspection. Taking advantage of the semi‐regenerative (or Markov renewal) properties of the maintained system state, we construct a stochastic model of the time behaviour of the maintained system at steady state. This stochastic model allows to evaluate several performance criteria for the maintenance policy such as the long‐run system availability and the long‐run expected maintenance cost. Numerical experiments illustrate the behaviour of the proposed condition‐based maintenance policy. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Optimal spare ordering policy for preventive replacement under cost effectiveness criterion

This paper presents a spare ordering policy for preventive replacement with age-dependent minimal repair and salvage value consideration. The spare unit for replacement is available only by order and the lead-time for delivering the spare due to regular or expedited ordering follows general distributions. To analyze the ordering policy, the failure process is modelled by a non-homogeneous Poisson process. By introducing the costs due to ordering, repairs, replacements and downtime, as well as the salvage value of an un-failed system, the expected cost effectiveness in the long run are derived as a criterion of optimality. It is shown, under certain conditions, there exists a finite and unique optimum ordering time which maximizes the expected cost effectiveness. Finally, numerical examples are given for illustration.     

Optimal replacement model with age-dependent failure type based on a cumulative repair-cost limit policy

This paper presents a replacement model with age-dependent failure type based on a cumulative repair-cost limit policy, whose concept uses the information of all repair costs to decide whether the system is repaired or replaced. As failures occur, the system experiences one of the two types of failures: a type-I failure (minor), rectified by a minimal repair; or a type-II failure (catastrophic) that calls for a replacement. A critical type-I failure means a minor failure at which the accumulated repair cost exceeds the pre-determined limit for the first time. The system is replaced at the nth type-I failure, or at a critical type-I failure, or at first type-II failure, whichever occurs first. The optimal number of minimal repairs before replacement which minimizes the mean cost rate is derived and studied in terms of its existence and uniqueness. Several classical models in maintenance literature are special cases of our model.     

Relaxation‐time limit of the three‐dimensional hydrodynamic model with boundary effects

In this paper, we study three‐dimensional (3D) unipolar and bipolar hydrodynamic models and corresponding drift‐diffusion models from semiconductor devices on bounded domain. Based on the asymptotic behavior of the solutions to the initial boundary value problems with slip boundary condition, we investigate the relation between the 3D hydrodynamic semiconductor models and the corresponding drift‐diffusion models. That is, we discuss the relation‐time limit from the 3D hydrodynamic semiconductor models to the corresponding drift‐diffusion models by comparing the large‐time behavior of these two models. These results can be showed by energy arguments. Copyrightcopyright 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Higher order limit q‐Bernstein operators

In this paper we give the estimates of the central moments for the limit q‐Bernstein operators. We introduce the higher order generalization of the limit q‐Bernstein operators and using the moment estimations study the approximation properties of these newly defined operators. It is shown that the higher order limit q‐Bernstein operators faster than the q‐Bernstein operators for the smooth functions defined on [0, 1]. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An information‐based burn‐in procedure for minimally repaired items from mixed population

Burn‐in is a method used to eliminate the initial failures in field use. In this paper, we will consider an information‐based burn‐in procedure for repairable items, which is completely new type of burn‐in procedure. By this procedure, based on the operational (failure and repair) history of the items observed during burn‐in procedure, those with poor reliability performance are eliminated. From a probabilistic point of view, this burn‐in procedure utilizes the information contained in the ‘random paths’ of the corresponding point processes. A general formulation of the model will be suggested, and under the suggested framework, two‐stage optimization procedure for determining optimal burn‐in procedures will be studied in detail. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Strong solutions to an Oldroyd‐B model with slip boundary conditions via incompressible limit

In this paper, we establish the local existence of strong solutions to an Oldroyd‐B model for the incompressible viscoelastic fluids in a bounded domain , via the incompressible limit. The main idea is to derive the uniform estimates with respect to the Mach number for the linearized system of compressible Oldroyd equations. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A BGK‐penalization‐based asymptotic‐preserving scheme for the multispecies Boltzmann equation

An asymptotic‐preserving (AP) scheme is efficient in solving multiscale problems where kinetic and hydrodynamic regimes coexist. In this article, we extend the BGK‐penalization‐based AP scheme, originally introduced by Filbet and Jin for the single species Boltzmann equation (Filbet and Jin, J Comput Phys 229 (2010) 7625–7648), to its multispecies counterpart. For the multispecies Boltzmann equation, the new difficulties arise due to: (1) the breaking down of the conservation laws for each species and (2) different convergence rates to equilibria for different species in disparate masses systems. To resolve these issues, we find a suitable penalty function—the local Maxwellian that is based on the mean velocity and mean temperature and justify various asymptotic properties of this method. This AP scheme does not contain any nonlinear nonlocal implicit solver, yet it can capture the fluid dynamic limit with time step and mesh size independent of the Knudsen number. Numerical examples demonstrate the correct asymptotic‐behavior of the scheme. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Numer Methods Partial Differential Eq 2013     

Klein‐Gordon‐Zakharov system in energy space: Blow‐up profile and subsonic limit

In this paper, we prove finite‐time blowup in energy space for the three‐dimensional Klein‐Gordon‐Zakharov (KGZ) system by modified concavity method. We obtain the blow‐up rates of solutions in local and global space, respectively. In addition, by using the energy convergence, we study the subsonic limit of the Cauchy problem for KGZ system and prove that any finite energy solution converges to the corresponding solution of Klein‐Gordon equation in energy space.     

A fixed point theorem for o‐minimal structures

We prove a definable analogue to Brouwer's Fixed Point Theorem for o‐minimal structures of real closed field expansions: A continuous definable function mapping from the unit simplex into itself admits a fixed point, even though the underlying space is not necessarily topologically complete. Our proof is direct and elementary; it uses a triangulation technique for o‐minimal functions, with an application of Sperner's Lemma. (© 2003 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Existence and zero‐electron‐mass limit of strong solutions to the stationary compressible Navier‐Stokes‐Poisson equation with large external force

In this study, we consider a viscous compressible model of plasma and semiconductors, which is expressed as a compressible Navier‐Stokes‐Poisson equation. We prove that there exists a strong solution to the boundary value problem of the steady compressible Navier‐Stokes‐Poisson equation with large external forces in bounded domain, provided that the ratio of the electron/ions mass is appropriately small. Moreover, the zero‐electron‐mass limit of the strong solutions is rigorously verified. The main idea in the proof is to split the original equation into 4 parts, a system of stationary incompressible Navier‐Stokes equations with large forces, a system of stationary compressible Navier‐Stokes equations with small forces, coupled with 2 Poisson equations. Based on the known results about linear incompressible Navier‐Stokes equation, linear compressible Navier‐Stokes, linear transport, and Poisson equations, we try to establish uniform in the ratio of the electron/ions mass a priori estimates. Further, using Schauder fixed point theorem, we can show the existence of a strong solution to the boundary value problem of the steady compressible Navier‐Stokes‐Poisson equation with large external forces. At the same time, from the uniform a priori estimates, we present the zero‐electron‐mass limit of the strong solutions, which converge to the solutions of the corresponding incompressible Navier‐Stokes‐Poisson equations.     

On the image of the limit q‐Bernstein operator

The limit q‐Bernstein operator B_q emerges naturally as an analogue to the Szász–Mirakyan operator related to the Euler distribution. Alternatively, B_q comes out as a limit for a sequence of q‐Bernstein polynomials in the case 0<q<1. Lately, different properties of the limit q‐Bernstein operator and its iterates have been studied by a number of authors. In particular, it has been shown that B_q is a positive shape‐preserving linear operator on C[0, 1] with ∥B_q∥=1, which possesses the following remarkable property: in general, it improves the analytic properties of a function. In this paper, new results on the properties of the image of B_q are presented. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The 3‐D bifurcation and limit cycles in a food‐chain model

In this paper, by using a corollary to the center manifold theorem, we show that the 3‐D food‐chain model studied by many authors undergoes a 3‐D Hopf bifurcation, and then we obtain the existence of limit cycles for the 3‐D differential system. The methods used here can be extended to many other 3‐D differential equation models. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Existence and limit behavior of prescribed L2‐norm solutions for Schrödinger‐Poisson‐Slater systems in

In this paper, we study constraint minimizers of the following L ²?critical minimization problem: where E (u ) is the Schrödinger‐Poisson‐Slater functional and N denotes the mass of the particles in the Schrödinger‐Poisson‐Slater system. We prove that e (N ) admits minimizers for and, however, no minimizers for N >N ^?, where Q (x ) is the unique positive solution of in . Some results on the existence and nonexistence of minimizers for e (N ^?) are also established. Further, when e (N ^?) does not admit minimizers, the limit behavior of minimizers as N ↗N ^? is also analyzed rigorously.     

A numerical study of the semi‐classical limit for three‐coupled long wave–short wave interaction equations

We study numerically the semi‐classical limit for three‐coupled long wave–short wave interaction equations. The Fourier–Galerkin semi‐discretization is proved to be spectrally convergent in an appropriate energy space. We propose a split‐step Fourier method in the semi‐classical regime with the discussion of the meshing strategy, which is necessary to obtain correct numerical solution. Plane wave solution with weak and strong initial phases, solitary wave solution and Gaussian solution are considered to investigate the semi‐classical limit.