Abstract
The maintenance policy and the quality of service throughout the bus’s life cycle can be measured through their costs along time that, when evaluated using Lifespan or Economic Life Cycle methods, allow to determine the renewal or the replacement time. The paper discusses these two models, using real data from an urban bus fleet company. The maths that supports the models are presented. They are considered the functioning and maintenance costs, and also the apparent rate. The Life Cycle Cost of an urban transport bus is strongly dependent on the policy and quality of its maintenance, from which it depends on its reliability and availability. The final result is reflected on its Life Cycle Cost, that can be evaluated through the Lifespan or the Economic Life Cycle methods. Other aspects that can be considered are the fuel costs and the type of terrain, because they are intrinsically interrelated and have a strong effect on costs, namely because they imply strong variation in the bus’s consumption and in their maintenance costs. As the company considered in the case study has a poor maintenance policy, it makes the analysis challenging, making difficult to compare the economic life cycle with the lifespan method in this situation. However, the results and conclusions that are taken from them are obvious, what demonstrates the models’ utility and robustness.
Highlights
In the passenger transport sector, the determination of the most rational time for bus replacement is related to the efficient use of the buses and the company’s global costs
The paper is structured : Engineering and Applied Sciences 2019; 4(2): 30-43 i) This section that corresponds to the introduction; ii) Section two makes a summary of the state of the art; iii) Section three presents a summary of the main econometric models used; iv) Section four applies the data of a bus fleet company to the economic life cycle; v) Section five applies the data of a bus fleet company to the lifespan; vi) Section six presents the conclusions
Two other ways to estimate the best time for replacement are the lifespan method and the analysis of the economic cycle are: i) Lifespan - withdrawal occurs when the operating costs exceed the costs of maintenance plus the amortization of the capital cost of an equivalent piece of new equipment; Hugo Raposo et al.: Economic Life Cycle versus Lifespan – A Case Study of an Urban Bus Fleet ii) Economic cycle - the optimal period is which that minimizes the average total costs of operation, maintenance and capital immobilization [12]
Summary
In the passenger transport sector, the determination of the most rational time for bus replacement is related to the efficient use of the buses and the company’s global costs. The value of money is directly linked to time, because the later an asset is withdrawn from service or renewed, the greater the action of external agents on it and the greater the influence of macroeconomic factors on its value, being this negative or positive. This has a relevant effect on the costs in the transportation sector. The paper uses real data from an urban bus fleet It compares economic life cycle analysis with lifespan analysis and notes how other maintenance policies would have different consequences. The paper is structured : Engineering and Applied Sciences 2019; 4(2): 30-43 i) This section that corresponds to the introduction; ii) Section two makes a summary of the state of the art; iii) Section three presents a summary of the main econometric models used; iv) Section four applies the data of a bus fleet company to the economic life cycle; v) Section five applies the data of a bus fleet company to the lifespan; vi) Section six presents the conclusions
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