A condition-based maintenance policy for multi-component systems with a high maintenance setup cost

Condition-based maintenance (CBM) is becoming increasingly important due to the development of advanced sensor and information technology, which facilitates the remote collection of condition data. We propose a new CBM policy for multi-component systems with continuous stochastic deteriorations. To reduce the high setup cost of maintenance, a joint maintenance interval is introduced. With this interval and the control limits of components as decision variables, we develop a model for the minimization of the average long-run maintenance cost rate of the systems. Moreover, a numerical study of a production system consisting of a large number of non-identical components is presented, including a sensitivity analysis. Finally, our policy is compared to a failure-based policy and an age-based policy, in order to evaluate the cost-saving potential.