Reliability Data: Recurrent Events Data

Recurrent events data arise in applications where more than one event (e.g., repair, replacement, failure, return) can be recorded for a fleet or population of units that are monitored over time. In some cases, each event has a cost associated with it. Maintenance databases for locomotive engines keep track of replacements of cylinders in particular engines, but do not provide information about which cylinder was replaced. This is because the databases were designed for financial purposes for which the exact location of the cylinder is irrelevant. In such applications, cylinder failure-time data cannot be obtained. Nevertheless, powerful statistical methods for recurrent events data, described in Chapter 22 of SMRD2, can be used to extract useful information from such databases.