Cost-benefit analysis of an n-unit repairable adaptive system

Abstract

In this paper, an n-unit shared parallel system is considered. Initially, all the n-units share the total load equally and when one or more units fail, they go in for the repair facility while the other surviving units share the entire load equally till the failed units are ready for operation after installation. The installation time is assumed to be non-negligible. The system will be down only when all the units are non-operative. Assuming that the failure rates are different when the units function under varying loads, the system characteristics, namely. 1. (1) the expected up-time of the system during the period (0, t], 2. (2) the expected repair time of the units which failed due to varying failure rates during the period (0, t] and 3. (3) the expected time the units spend in the switchover/installation state during the period (0, t] are studied by identifying the system at suitable regeneration epochs. The cost-benefit analysis is carried out using these system characteristics.