Maintainability Design Research Articles

Development of a design-for-maintainability assessment of building systems in the tropics

The lack of Design for Maintainability (DfM) leads to avoidable building component defects and unproductive building operations. This study reports on the development of a building design assessment system which predicts maintainability impacts of design alternatives. A mixed method approach was used in this study where 1372 DfM benchmarks from 404 national and international building standards were analysed qualitatively to identify benchmarks relating to 123 critical building defects. Five Bayesian Belief Networks (BBN) were developed using five-year defect data and expert judgements from 95 case buildings. Monetary quantification of results was carried out, indicating the complex relationships between DfM benchmarks and building defects to great effect. The Bayesian networks were operationally validated using scenario tests and sensitivity analysis. The predictive power of the developed system is illustrated using an application to a hypothetical case study. This novel consequence-based DfM assessment system is a decision making tool aiding in designing more maintainable building systems which are more productive in terms of materials, labour and cost.

Overview of Design for Maintainability in Building and Construction Research

AbstractThe body of knowledge on design for maintainability (DfM) is increasing. However, there is currently no systematic analysis of the diversified DfM-related issues and research. Through a sys...

A kaleidoscopic view of psychology in design for maintainability of mechanical systems

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to review the literature on design for maintainability with emphasis on psychology and cognitive sciences and suggest possible gaps from the point of view of researchers and practitioners.Design/methodology/approachThe paper systematically reviews the published literature and then analyzes it methodically.FindingsThe paper discusses a new shift in engineering design, in general, and design for maintainability (DFM) of mechanical systems, in particular.Practical implicationsLiterature on DFM of mechanical systems with psychological factors has so far been very limited. This paper reviews a number of papers from the field of mechanical engineering and other related branches of engineering, along with important papers from the field of psychology and cognitive sciences. Subsequently, various merging trends in the field of DFM are identified to help researchers specifying gaps in the literature and direct the research efforts suitably.Originality/valueThe paper contains a comprehensive listing of publications in the field of maintainability from the psychology point of view. The paper will be useful to researchers, designers, maintenance professionals and others concerned with maintainability of a system. This paper is equally useful for the researchers and design professionals from the domain of engineering design irrespective of their field of application.