Modelling rail track deterioration and maintenance: current practices and future needs

As commercialisation and privatisation of railway systems reach the political agendas in a number of countries, including Australia, the separation of infrastructure from operating business dictates that track costs need to be shared on an equitable basis. There is also a world-wide trend towards increased pressures on rail track infrastructure through increases in axle loads and train speeds. Such productivity and customer service driven pressures inevitably lead to reductions in the life of track components and increases in track maintenance costs. This paper provides a state-of-the-art review of track degradation modeling, as well as an overview of track maintenance decision support systems currently in use in North America and Europe. The essential elements of a maintenance optimisation model currently under development are also highlighted

Inference and dynamic decision-making for deteriorating systems with probabilistic dependencies through Bayesian networks and deep reinforcement learning

In the context of modern environmental and societal concerns, there is an increasing demand for methods able to identify management strategies for civil engineering systems, minimizing structural failure risks while optimally planning inspection and maintenance (I&M) processes. Most available methods simplify the I&M decision problem to the component level due to the computational complexity associated with global optimization methodologies under joint system-level state descriptions. In this paper, we propose an efficient algorithmic framework for inference and decision-making under uncertainty for engineering systems exposed to deteriorating environments, providing optimal management strategies directly at the system level. In our approach, the decision problem is formulated as a factored partially observable Markov decision process, whose dynamics are encoded in Bayesian network conditional structures. The methodology can handle environments under equal or general, unequal deterioration correlations among components, through Gaussian hierarchical structures and dynamic Bayesian networks. In terms of policy optimization, we adopt a deep decentralized multi-agent actor-critic (DDMAC) reinforcement learning approach, in which the policies are approximated by actor neural networks guided by a critic network. By including deterioration dependence in the simulated environment, and by formulating the cost model at the system level, DDMAC policies intrinsically consider the underlying system-effects. This is demonstrated through numerical experiments conducted for both a 9-out-of-10 system and a steel frame under fatigue deterioration. Results demonstrate that DDMAC policies offer substantial benefits when compared to state-of-the-art heuristic approaches. The inherent consideration of system-effects by DDMAC strategies is also interpreted based on the learned policies

Guidelines for data collection and monitoring for asset management of New Zealand road bridges

Publisher PD

Predictive maintenance policy for a gradually deteriorating system subject to stress

International audienceThis paper deals with a predictive maintenance policy for a continuously deteriorating system subject to stress. We consider a system with two failure mechanisms which are, respectively, due to an excessive deterioration level and a shock. To optimize the maintenance policy of the system, an approach combining statistical process control (SPC) and condition-based maintenance (CBM) is proposed. CBM policy is used to inspect and replace the system according to the observed deterioration level. SPC is used to monitor the stress covariate. In order to assess the performance of the proposed maintenance policy and to minimize the long-run expected maintenance cost per unit of time, a mathematical model for the maintained system cost is derived. Analysis based on numerical results are conducted to highlight the properties of the proposed maintenance policy in respect to the different maintenance parameters

Quality Program Provisions for Aeronautical and Space System Contractors

This publication sets forth quality program requirements for NASA aeronautical and space programs, systems, subsystems, and related services. These requirements provide for the effective operation of a quality program which ensures that quality criteria and requirements are recognized, definitized, and performed satisfactorily

Semi-Markov and delay time models of maintenance

This thesis is concerned with modelling inspection policies of facilities which Qraduallv deteriorate in time. The context of inspection policies lends itself readily to probabilistic modelling. Indeed, many of the published theoretical models to be found in the literature adopt a Markov approach, where states are usually 'operating', 'operating but fault present', and 'failed'. However, most of these models fail to discuss the 'fit' of the model to data,a nd virtually no exampleso f actual applications or case-studiesa re to be found. hi a series of recent papers dating from 1984, a robust approach to solve these problems has been introduced and developed as the Delay Time Model (DTM). The central concept for this model is the delay time, h, of a fault which is the time lapse from when a fault could first be noticed until the time when its repair can be delayed no longer because of unacceptable consequences. The bottle neck in delay time modelling is how to estimate the delay time distribution parameters. Two methods for estimating these parameters have been developed. namely the subjective method and the objective method. Markov models have the advantage of an extensive body of theory. 'fliere are, however. difficulties of definition, measurement, and calculation when applying Markov models to real-world situations within a maintenance context. Indeed. this problem has motivated the current research which ainis to explore the two modelling methodologies in cases where comparison is valid, and also to gain an insight as to how robust Markov inspection models can be as decision-aids where Markovian properties are not strictly satisfied. It Nvill be seen that a class of inspection problems could be solved by a serni- Markov model using the delay time concept. In this thesis, a typical senii-i%Ia, rkov inspection model based upon the delay time concept is presented for a complex repairable systein that may fail during the course of its service lifetime and the results are compared. Finally, a case study of the senii-Markov inspection model and the delay time model is discussed