Optimal burn-in strategy for two-dimensional warranted products considering preventive maintenance

Burn-in and preventive maintenance (PM) are effective approaches to reduce the number of warranty claims and warranty cost during post-sale support. With harsher burn-in settings, early product defects can be removed, but at the same time product degradation is accelerated and more wear-out failures may be introduced. PM actions within warranty alleviate these negative effects. This paper proposes an optimal burn-in strategy for repairable products sold with a two-dimensional base warranty (BW) and an optional extended warranty (EW). Both performance-based and cost-based models incorporating PMs are developed to obtain optimal burn-in settings, including the burn-in duration and the burn-in usage rate, so as to minimise the expected number of warranty claims and total cost respectively. The impacts of different accelerated coefficients and PM degrees on the optimal burn-in strategy are analysed. In view of the performance and cost structures, we conduct numerical examples to illustrate the applicability of the proposed models. Practical implications from a sensitivity analysis for key parameters are also elaborated.