Complex System Maintenance Handbook (Hardcover, 2008 ed.)

The efficient functioning of modern society depends on the smooth operation of many complex systems which provide products and services. These include transport systems, communication systems, utilities, manufacturing plants, processing plants, hospitals and banks. Such systems are unreliable in the sense that they degrade with age and/or usage and fail when they are no longer capable of delivering the products and services. When a complex system fails, the consequences can be dramatic. It can result in serious economic losses, affect humans and do serious damage to the environment. These failures can be controlled through preventive maintenance actions.

Due to advances in the understanding of the physics of failure, and in the technologies used to combat this failure; the literature on maintenance of unreliable systems is vast. Complex System Maintenance Handbook is the first book to integrate this vast literature with chapters written by internationally-renowned active researchers and experienced practitioners focussing on different aspects of maintenance. Each chapter will review the literature dealing with a particular aspect of maintenance, report on developments and trends in a particular industry sector or present a case study.

Complex System Maintenance Handbook narrows the gap between theory and practice and will trigger new research on different aspects of maintenance. It will be of interest to maintenance engineers and managers working in industry as well as researchers and graduate students in the fields of maintenance, industrial engineering and applied mathematics.