Generalized stationary models for scheduling single and multiple preventive maintenance routines

This paper is concerned with the development and applicationof stationary models for scheduling single and multiple preventivemaintenance (PM) situations focusing on issues of model implementation.The first part of the paper deals with the practical implementationof the basic single PM scheduling model based on the renewalprocess. The main practical difficulty is lifetime-distributionselection for small data sets which is typical in PM situations.Thus a sensitivity analysis of optimal PM interval to selectedlife distributions following PM and failures (corrective maintenance)is carried out. It has been found that the selected pair ofdistributions using AIC criteria as well as the Weibull–Weibullfitted pair have the smallest availability loss in estimatingthe optimal PM interval. The second part of this paper is concernedwith modelling multi-PM situations—something which hasreceived very little attention in the literature despite itsfrequent implementation in real life. A multi-PM model basedon the renewal process is discussed. The model assumes a multi-PMinterval which is an integer multiple of the single PM intervalsand different renewal functions following each type of PM. Theprocedure of model implementation is discussed through numericalexample.