PHYSICS OF FAILURE AND ITS ROLE IN MAINTENANCE

Abstract

The majority of the challenges in the field of maintenance are associated to failures and their prevention. Understanding why, when and how components fail should therefore play an important role in many aspects of maintenance management and engineering. The key issue of maintenance is finding the optimal balance between minimizing the effects of failing (sub-) systems on the one hand, and minimizing the maintenance costs on the other. For critical systems, where failures have serious consequences in terms of costs, safety, environmental effects or consequential damage, measures are generally taken to prevent such failures from occurring and spending a considerable budget on preventive maintenance is then justified. However, for many critical applications in the industries, company, organization, military, aerospace and nuclear power sectors, this risk avoidance has resulted in a very conservative maintenance approach. Many components are replaced far before they reach the end of their actual service life. Maintenance programmes are then effective (in preventing failures), but not very efficient.