Optimal burn‐in policy for mixed population of products under two‐dimensional combination warranty

Abstract

AbstractIn actual production, the heterogeneity of products is ubiquitous. This article considers a new burn‐in model for repairable products sold with a two‐dimensional combination warranty . It is assumed that the products are heterogeneous and that all failures during the warranty period are repaired by the minimal repair at subpopulations level. Performance‐based and cost‐based models are developed to obtain optimal burn‐in policies under the non‐renewing two‐dimensional combination warranty policy, respectively. First, under mild conditions, we show that the optimal burn‐in time and the optimal usage rate should be as high as possible, provided that the burn‐in time and the burn‐in usage rate have the upper bounds. Second, we analyze the influence of incorrect use of the failure rate function instead of the intensity function on performance‐based and cost‐based models. Finally, we compare the optimal burn‐in policies of the two models. One illustrative example and relevant sensitivity analysis are also presented.