OPTIMAL PREVENTIVE-MAINTENANCE POLICY FOR LEASE PRODUCTS UNDER A THRESHOLD VALUE ON FAILURE RATE

摘要

This paper investigates the optimal threshold value on failure rate for leased productswith a Weibull lifetime distribution. Within a lease period, any failure of the product is rectified by minimal repairs and a penalty may occur to the lessor when the time required to perform a minimal repair exceeds a reasonable time limit. To reduce product failures, additional preventive maintenance actions are carried out when the failure rate reaches a threshold value. Under this maintenance scheme, a mathematical model of the expected total cost is established and the optimal threshold value and the corresponding maintenance degrees are derived such that the expected total cost is minimized. The structural properties of the optimal policy are investigated in detail. Finally, numerical examples are provided to illustrate the features of the optimal policy.