The Preventive Maintenance Policy for Mechanical System Based on Dynamic Reliability: An Application of Tabu Method

This research tries to find the optimal preventive replacement policy for the mechanical system with series configuration between modules, determines the frequency of unexpected breakdowns and the related spare part quantity to maintain the system in a required level of availability, at the lowest cost. All modules within this mechanical system are unreliable with increasing hazard rate function. The repair time for any failed module is following exponential distribution. In this model, based on the trade-off analysis of average costs for performing the preventive replacement to keep system continuing to operate or stop replacement until system phase-out. Tabu method will be applied to find the optimal preventive replacement cycle, schedule and combination of modules under different system reliability requirements. Finally, the related spare part quantity within system life cycle and the schedule for system phase-out will also be decided.