The Use of a Multi-Objective Optimization Method to Construct a Decision Support Tool for Maintenance Optimization Strategy
Open Access DepositedMaintenance Optimization is usually employed to understand how the maintenance of a commodity can be pursued at the lowest cost. What becomes a challenge is that maintenance also carries the objective of achieving the maximum availability of that commodity to the user. This availability, and maintenance of it, come at a cost that is essentially a consequence of the execution of maintenance. Collins Aerospace is a large aerospace manufacturing company with many sites around the world. One site of importance is the Pheonix Aerospace Electronics Manufacturing facility located in Pheonix, Arizona. For that manufacturer to provide high-quality products to its customers, those products undergo rigorous testing before being shipped. This testing is performed by very complex electronics testing equipment that must be maintained to keep pace with the demanding delivery schedule the company is held to. At one time, the average system availability for all test equipment at the facility was recorded as 72%. This would mean that equipment cannot be used by the manufacturer for almost 30% of its required time for operation. This shows why maintenance is one of the highest priorities for a manufacturer. While most maintenance optimization strategies focus on real-time operation, the strategy chosen for this study has to do with planning before acquisition. When equipment is acquired, the maintenance effort that will be required to preserve its life-cycle must be considered. It is at this point the acquiring organization can make a choice. Depending on how they want to fund their maintenance effort they can either choose to conduct maintenance internally or outsource the work. The goal of this study will be to construct a Decision Support Tool using 1.5 years of data from the facility’s own maintenance records. This tool will calculate what the maintenance effort will cost to achieve the chosen system availability. With that value, a manufacturing maintenance organization will be able to decide if it is better to outsource maintenance or execute the effort themselves.
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