Reliability Models of Maintained Systems

Zahir Abdul Haddi Hassan

University of Babylon College of Education for pure Sciences,
Dept. of Mathematics

Abstract
In this papers we studying reliability models of maintained systems , and we take some definitions
and general concepts that to help in calculating maintained systems such as, time to repair (pdf), mean-
time-between-failure (MTBF) , repair rate and mean time to repair (MTTR), some of the commonly
used maintainability engineering terms are introduced , at last we using exponential distribution in
evaluating maintainability models.

‫اﻟﺧﻼﺻﺔ‬
‫ وﺗﻧــﺎول أﻫــم اﻟﻣﻔــﺎﻫﯾم اﻟﺗــﻲ ﺗــﺳﺎﻋد ﻓــﻲ ﺣــﺳﺎب ﺻــﯾﺎﻧﺔ‬، ‫ﻓــﻲ ﻫــذا اﻟﺑﺣــث ﺗــم د ارﺳــﺔ ﻧﻣــﺎذج وﺛوﻗﯾــﺔ اﻷﻧظﻣــﺔ اﻟﺗــﻲ ﺗﺧــﺿﻊ ﻟﻠــﺻﯾﺎﻧﺔ‬
‫ﺛم ﺟرت ﻣﻘﺎرﻧﻪ ﻟﺑﻌض اﻟدوال اﻟﺗﻲ ﺗـﺳﺎﻋد ﻋﻠـﻰ إﯾﺟـﺎد ﺛﻘـﺔ‬، ‫ اﻟﺦ‬... ‫ ﻣﻌدل اﻟﺻﯾﺎﻧﺔ‬، ‫ ﻣﺗوﺳط اﻟوﻗت ﺑﯾن اﻟﻔﺷل‬، ‫اﻷﻧظﻣﺔ ﻛـداﻟﺔ اﻟﺻﯾﺎﻧﺔ‬
‫ وﻓـﻲ اﻟﻧﻬﺎﯾـﺔ ﺗﻧـﺎول اﻟﺑﺣـث أﻫـم اﻟﺗوزﯾﻌـﺎت اﻟﺗـﻲ ﺗـﺳﺗﻌﻣل ﻓـﻲ ﺗﻘﯾـﯾم ﺻـﯾﺎﻧﺔ اﻷﻧظﻣـﺔ‬، ‫ﻧظﯾرﺗﻬﺎ اﻟﺗﻲ ﺗـﺳﺎﻋد ﻓـﻲ ﺣـﺳﺎب ﺻـﯾﺎﻧﺗﻪ‬
‫ا‬ ‫اﻟﻧظﺎم ﻣﻊ‬
.‫وﻗد اﺳﺗﻌﻣﻠﻧﺎ اﻟﺗوزﯾﻊ اﻻﺳﻲ ﻣﻊ ﻣﺛﺎل ﺗوﺿﯾﺣﻲ ﻟﺑﯾﺎن ﻛﯾﻔﯾﺔ ﺣﺳﺎب ﺻﯾﺎﻧﺔ اﻷﻧظﻣﺔ‬

1. Introduction
"The language of engineering is mathematics". The theories behind each
engineering specialty are concisely stated in a set of mathematical procedures. For the
engineering specialties of reliability and maintainability, the theories are stated in the
mathematics of probability and statistics. The underlying reason for the use of these
concepts is the inherent uncertainty in predicting a failure. Even given a failure model
based on physical or chemical reactions, the results will not be the time a part will
fail, but rather the time a given percentage of the parts will fail or the probability that
a given part will fail in a specified time. Individual parts will fail according to their
individual strengths, which will vary from part to part and are practically unknowable.
Similarly, the time to repair a failure will also vary dependent on many factors
whose values in individual cases are practically unknowable. The past studies has
been shown that the reliability of a system can be improved by means of redundancy .
[Govil A.K., 1983, Srinath L.S., 1985]
Consideration is now given to a system wherein components can be repaired
and so enable the system to be restored to full effectiveness in a given period of time .
By combining the repair capability and the systems reliability , it is possible to
express in quantitative terms the probability that the system will be effective , in spite
of failures occurring and repairs being carried out.

2. Some Definitions and General Concepts

In this papers , we will present some concepts in reliability and maintainability
theory which concern our work for calculating the Maintainability and most of those
definition are taken from [Norman A. M., Michael T., 2009 , Sandlar Gerald H.,
1963 ]

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 Journal of Babylon University/Pure and Applied Sciences/ No.(6)/ Vol.(21): 2013

Definition (1) Mean Life ()

The mean life () refers to the total population of items being considered. For
example, given an initial population of n items, if all are operated until they fail, the
mean life () is merely the arithmetic mean time to failure of the total population
given by:
n

t
i 1
i
 …(1)
n
where:
ti = time to failure of the ith item in the population
n = total number of items in the population
Definition (2) Mean-Time-Between-Failure (MTBF)
This concept appears quite frequently in reliability literature; it applies to
repairable items in which failed elements are replaced upon failure. The expression
for MTBF is:

MTBF =T(t)/r …(2)

where:
T(t) = total operating time
r = number of failures
It is important to remember that MTBF only has meaning for repairable items,
and, for that case, MTBF represents exactly the same parameter as mean life ().
More important is the fact that a constant failure rate is assumed. Thus, given the two
assumptions of replacement upon failure and constant failure rate, the reliability
function is:

R(t) = e t = e t/ = e-t/MTBF …(4)

and (for this case)
=1/MTBF …(5)
3. Maintainability Theory
In reliability, one is concerned with designing an item to last as long as
possible without failure; in maintainability, the emphasis is on designing an item so
that a failure can be repaired as quickly as possible. The combination of high
reliability and high maintainability results in high system availability[Srinath L.S.,
1985 , Miller L. E., Kelleher J. J., Wong L., 1993].
Maintainability, then, is a measure of the ease and rapidity with which a
system or equipment can be restored to operational status following a failure. It is a
function of the equipment design and installation, personnel availability in the
required skill levels, adequacy of maintenance procedures and test equipment, and the
physical environment under which maintenance is performed.
As with reliability, maintainability parameters are also probabilistic and are
analyzed by the use of continuous and discrete random variables, probabilistic
parameters, and statistical distributions. An example of a discrete maintainability
parameter is the number of maintenance actions completed in some time t, whereas an
example of a continuous maintainability parameter is the time to complete a
maintenance action.

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4. Basic Concepts
A good way to look at basic maintainability concepts is in terms of functions
which are analogous to those in reliability. They may be derived in a way identical to
that done for reliability [Govil A.K.,1983,Srinath L.S., 1985 ] by merely substituting
t (time-to-restore) for t (time-to-failure), (repair rate) for (failure rate), and M(t)
(probability of successfully completing a repair action in time t, or P(T t)) for F(t)
(probability of failing by age t, or P(T t)). In other words, the following
correspondences prevail in maintainability and reliability engineering functions.
(1) The time-to-failure probability density function (pdf) in reliability corresponds to
the time-to-maintain pdf in maintainability.
(2) The failure rate function in reliability corresponds to the repair rate function in
maintainability. Repair rate is the rate with which a repair action is performed and is
expressed in terms of the number of repair actions performed and successfully
completed per hour.
(3) The probability of system failure, or system unreliability, corresponds to the
probability of successful system maintenance, or system maintainability. These and
other analogous functions are summarized in Table 1.Thus, as illustrated in Figure1,
maintainability can be expressed either as a measure of the time (T) required to repair
a given percentage (P%) of all system failures, or as a probability (P) of restoring the
system to operational status within a period of time (T) following a failure.Some of
the commonly used maintainability engineering terms are portrayed graphically in
Figure 2 as a maintainability “function” derived as illustrated for the case where the
pdf has a lognormal distribution [Roy B., Ronald N.A., 1992, Klaas B., Jack C.L.,
2006] . Points (1), (2), and (3) shown in the figure identify the mean, median, and
maximum corrective time-to-repair, respectively.
RELIABILITY MAINTAINABILITY
Time to Failure (pdf) Time to Repair (pdf)
f(t) g(t)
Reliability Maintainability
 t
R(t) =  f (t )dt M(t) =  g (t )dt …(6)
t 0
Failure Rate Repair Rate
f (t ) g (t )
 (t )   (t )  …(7)
R(t ) 1  M (t )
Mean-Time-to-Failure Mean Time to Repair
 
MTTF= tf (t )dt
 MTTR= tg (t )dt
 …(8)
 

  R(t )dt
0
Pdf of Time to Failure Pdf of Time to Repair
f(t) = (t) • R(t) g(t) = (t) (1 - M(t))
 t   t 
=  (t ). exp    (t ) dt  =  (t ). exp    (t ) dt  …(9)
 0   0 

Table (1) : COMPARISON OF BASIC RELIABILITY

AND MAINTAINABILITY FUNCTIONS

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Journal of Babylon University/Pure and Applied Sciences/ No.(6)/ Vol.(21): 2013

FIGURE 1: BASIC METHODS OF MAINTAINABILITY MEASUREMENT

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FIGURE 2: EXAMPLE MAINTAINABILITY FUNCTION DERIVED FROM TIME-TO-
REPAIR DISTRIBUTION
(2), and (3) are defined as follows:

(1) Mean Time to Repair, M ct : The mean time required to complete a maintenance
action, i.e., total maintenance downtime divided by total maintenance actions for a
given period of time, given as

M ct 

 i M cti  …(10)
 i

where:
i = failure rate for the ith repairable element of the item for which maintainability is
to be determined, adjusted for duty cycle, catastrophic failures, tolerance and inter-
action failures, etc., which will result in deterioration of item performance to the point
that a maintenance action will be initiated.
Mct i = average corrective time required to repair the ith repairable element in the event
of its failure.
~
(2) Median Time to Repair, M Ct : The downtime within which 50% of all
maintenance actions can be completed.
(3) Maximum Time to Repair: The maximum time required to complete a specified,
e.g., 95%, percentage of all maintenance actions.
These terms will be described in more detail in the following section, in terms of the
form that they take, given the statistical distribution of time-to-repair.
5. Statistical Distributions Used in Maintainability Models
A smaller number of statistical distributions is used for maintainability analysis than
for reliability analysis. This may be due to the fact that maintainability has
traditionally lagged reliability theory in development.
The most commonly used distributions for maintainability analysis have been the
normal, lognormal, and exponential. Just as the exponential distribution has been the
one most widely used in reliability analysis of equipment/systems, In maintainability
analysis, the exponential distribution applies to maintenance tasks and
maintenance actions whose completion times are independent of previous
maintenance experience (e.g., substitution methods of failure isolation where several
equally likely alternatives are available and each alternative is exercised, one at a
time, until the one which caused the failure is isolated).[ Govil A.K., 1983, Srinath
L.S., 1985].
The lognormal distribution is used in reliability analysis of semiconductors and
fatigue life of certain types of mechanical components , Also it is most commonly
used for equipment/system maintainability analysis, It applies to most maintenance
tasks and repair actions comprised of several subsidiary tasks of unequal frequency
and time duration.[ Klaas B., Jack C.L., 2006 , Samanta B. , Sarkar B. ,
Mukherjee S.K., 2004 ]
There are two principal applications of the normal distribution to reliability. One
application deals with the analysis of items which exhibit failure due to wear, such as
mechanical devices. Frequently the wear-out failure distribution is sufficiently close
to normal that the use of this distribution for predicting or assessing reliability is valid.
Another application is in the analysis of manufactured items and their ability to meet

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 Journal of Babylon University/Pure and Applied Sciences/ No.(6)/ Vol.(21): 2013

specifications. No two parts made to the same specification are exactly alike. The
variability of parts leads to a variability in systems composed of those parts. The
design must take this part variability into account, otherwise the system may not meet
the specification requirement due to the combined effect of part variability. Another
aspect of this application is in quality control procedures.
In maintainability, the normal distribution applies to relatively straightforward
maintenance tasks and repair actions (e.g., simple removal and replacement tasks)
which consistently require a fixed amount of time to complete. Maintenance task
times of this nature are usually normally distributed.[ Rohit P., Satyadhar J., Parag
P., Sumant K. , 2010]
However, use of other distributions such as the Weibull and gamma is also
possible, depending upon the analysis of the data and the use of “goodness of fit”
tests.[Tang Yong, 2004, Klaas B., Jack C.L., 2006 ]
This paper will concentrate on the use of the Exponential distribution, and
give example of it use in maintainability analysis.
6. Using Exponential Distribution in Maintainability Models
Producing a probability density function given by
1  M cti 
g (t  M ct )  exp  …(11)
M ct M
 ct 
The method used in evaluating the maintainability parameters is similar to that
analyzing reliability with exponential times-to-failure [Norman A. M., Michael T.,
2009, Sandlar Gerald H., 1963]. The fundamental maintainability parameter is repair
rate, (t), which is the reciprocal of M ct , the mean-time-to repair (MTTR). Thus,
another expression for g(t) in terms of (t), the repair rate, is
g(t) = e-t …(12)
where is the repair rate (which is constant for the exponential case).
The maintainability function is given by
t t
M (t )   g (t )dt    e   t dt = 1-e-t …(13)
0 0
The MTTR is given by

M ct  
1  M ct i
…(14)
 N
If the maintainability function, M(t), is known, the MTTR can also be obtained from
t
MTTF  M ct  …(15)
ln1  M (t )
~
The median time to repair M ct is given by
~
M ct = 0.69 M ct …(16)
The maximum time to repair is given by
M max Ct  ke M ct …(17)
where:
 M cti 
ke = value of   at the specified percentage point on the exponential function
M
 ct 
at which M max ct is defined. Values of k e are shown in Table (2) .

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  ke
95% 3.00
90% 2.31
85% 1.90
80% 1.61

TABLE 2: VALUES OF ke FOR SPECIFIED 

Computer Example:
For a large computer installation, the maintenance crew logbook shows that over a
period of a month there were 15 unscheduled maintenance actions or downtimes, and
1200 minutes in emergency maintenance status. Based upon prior data on this
equipment, the maintainability analyst knew that the repair times were exponentially
distributed. A warranty contract between the computer company and the government
calls for a penalty payment of any downtime exceeding 100 minutes.[Rohit P.,
Satyadhar J., Parag P., Sumant K. , 2010]
Find the following:
1. The MTTR and repair rate
2. The maintainability function M(t) for 100 minutes, or the probability that the
warranty requirement is being met
3. The median time to repair
4. The time within which 95% of the maintenance actions can be completed.
Solution :
1. MTTR and Repair Rate
1200
MTTF  M ct   80 minutes
15
1
(repair rate) = = 1/80 = 0.0125 repairs/minute
M ct
2. Maintainability Function for 100 Minutes
M(100) = 1 - e-t = 1 - e-(0.0125)(100) = 1 - e-1.25 = 1 - 0.286 = 0.714
or a 71% probability of meeting the warranty requirement.
3. Median Time to Repair
~
M ct = 0.69 M ct = (0.69)(80) = 55.2 minutes
4. Time within which 95% of the Maintenance Actions can be Completed
M maxct = M 0.95 = 3 M ct = 3(80) = 240 minutes.

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 Journal of Babylon University/Pure and Applied Sciences/ No.(6)/ Vol.(21): 2013

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A Thesis , National University Of Singapore.

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