Article ID: | iaor20013787 |
Country: | Netherlands |
Volume: | 91 |
Start Page Number: | 41 |
End Page Number: | 47 |
Publication Date: | Aug 1999 |
Journal: | Annals of Operations Research |
Authors: | Koulamas Christos, Iakovou Eleftherios, Ip Chi M. |
Keywords: | markov processes |
A Markov decision model is presented to determine the optimal maintenance policy for a general production unit. The unique characteristic of the proposed model is the inclusion of the unit's throughput rate as a decision variable. We show that under appropriate assumptions, the generator matrix of the underlying Markov chain that models the unit's deterioration process exhibits a separability property which significantly facilitates the solution procedure.