A Problem in Equipment Maintenance

George H. Weiss
Additional contact information
George H. Weiss: Institute for Fluid Dynamics and Applied Mathematics, University of Maryland

Management Science, 1962, vol. 8, issue 3, 266-277

Abstract: There have been several publications dealing with the theory of semi-Markov processes, [1-6]. Most of these have been purely theoretical analyses, although it is realized that the theory has many potential applications, [4, 6], particularly to so-called "repairman" problems and to problems in reliability. Other work along these lines has recently appeared in the literature, [8-11]. These papers are concerned with the reliability of multi-state mechanisms [8], with surveillance plans, [9, 10] and with inventory problems. In particular, the work of Barlow and Proschan considers a model almost identical to our own, using renewal theory methods. Since the semi-Markov process can be considered to be a generalization of renewal theory, it is not surprising that such applications are the first to suggest themselves. It is the purpose of this paper to present an application of the theory of semi-Markov processes to a problem in maintenance theory and obtain results which we believe to be new. The body of this paper will consist of material relevant to the actual problem; a development of the theory as needed in our presentation will be found in the Appendix.

Date: 1962
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.8.3.266 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:8:y:1962:i:3:p:266-277

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Management Science from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().