Modelling in the absence of data: a case study of fleet maintenance in a developing country
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Modelling in the absence of data: a case study of ¯eet maintenance in a developing country MI Desa1 and AH Christer2*y 1
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia; and 2University of Salford, UK
Adequate and relevant objective data for modelling maintenance decision problems are often incomplete or not readily accessible. This is particularly true in developing countries. In this paper the experience gained between 1991±95 in conducting a maintenance study of an inter-city express bus ¯eet in a developing country is presented. The lack of available maintenance records and operating data rendered the study the most data-starved maintenance modelling exercise the authors have met before or since. The study required the use of subjective methods to both de®ne the problem and to estimate parameters, and the application of recently developed concepts in maintenance modelling along with snapshot analysis and delay time modelling. This imposed a structured approach to problem recognition and problem solution. The study contributed both directly and indirectly to a change in work culture and to a reduction in bus breakdown rate. The company was re-visited 5 years later speci®cally to seek evidence of lasting impact. Some evidence existed and is reported in the paper. Keywords: maintenance modelling; delay time concept; snapshot modelling; bus ¯eet; case study; developing countries
Introduction This paper reports on a 1991±95 study to assess the impact of an OR intervention in the maintenance practice of an inter-city bus company in a developing country, Malaysia. A feature of the initial study was the construction of a quantitative model in the absence of objective data, which is a not untypical tasking in developing countries.1 Indeed, the lack of objective data was so extreme in this case that the problem was an action research exercise for the researchers and an appropriate case to subsequently reexamine for impact. The study entailed the application of contemporarily developed concepts in maintenance modelling, namely delay time modelling, and the use of snapshot modelling to model the operational and maintenance practice of the bus company with a view to improving the ef®ciency of bus operations. Here, only the most rudimentary maintenance record and operating data were available for a brief period and very little prior data analysis and modelling were routinely conducted. On the other hand, the company was led by a highly motivated management team open to constructive comment and enthusiastic to improve their performance. The notion of snapshot modelling for maintenance problem recognition was introduced by Christer and Whitelaw.2 This technique is similar to failure modes and affects *Correspondence: AH Christer, The University of Salford, Salford M5 4WT, UK Centre for Operational Research and Applied Statistics. E-mail: [email protected] y Also Faculty of Technology Management, Eindhoven University of Technology,
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