Life Cycle Costing in High Complex Industries—Developing and Applying a Life Cycle Costing Approach in the Railway Industry

Author(s):  
Christian Hoffart ◽  
Philipp Stüer
Author(s):  
Laxman Yadu Waghmode ◽  
Anil Dattatraya Sahasrabudhe

The objective of this paper is to apply a methodology developed for effective implementation of life cycle costing (LCC) in design and procurement of repairable products/systems to railway wagons. From its origin in defense equipment in US in 1960s, the application of life cycle cost concept has now been extended to other areas of private and public sectors too. This is because the customers are now considering not only the initial product costs but also the cost implications associated with the entire life span of a product. This emerging trend in global markets is gradually forcing the product manufacturers to estimate and optimize the product LCC with reference to performance, safety, reliability (R), and maintainability (M). The life cycle cost of a repairable system is closely coupled to its reliability and maintainability and therefore a careful consideration to the R & M parameters in the product design stage is quite essential from the LCC viewpoint. Taking into consideration these aspects a generalized modeling methodology has been proposed to estimate the life cycle cost of repairable products based on R & M principles. Life cycle costing in railway industry has traditionally been focused on the prediction of investment of railway vehicle. But, today’s mass transit market has rapidly been changed and the suppliers are now forced to treat the LCC of entire railway system. Indian railways are the principle mode of transport for raw materials for steel plants, finished steel from steel plants, coal, oil, iron, cement, petroleum products, fertilizers and food grains in India. To serve this purpose BOXN wagons are used by Indian railways. The BOXN wagons typically have a life span of 35 years and being a repairable system experience multiple failures over their life span. In this paper, a generalized model for LCC of repairable products has been proposed and is applied to BOXN wagon of Indian railways and the results obtained are presented. The methodology presented herein is expected to provide some useful guidelines to the railway industry to predict and analyze the life cycle cost of railway vehicles.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (8) ◽  
pp. 3252 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marianna Lena Kambanou

Despite the existence of many life cycle costing (LCC) methods, LCC is not widely adopted and LCC methods are usually further tailored by practitioners. Moreover, little is known about how practising LCC improves life cycle management (LCM) especially if LCM is considered emergent and constantly developing. In a manufacturing company, LCC is prescriptively introduced to improve LCM. In the first part, this study describes how various methodological choices and other aspects of practising LCC were the outcome of contestation and conformity with extant practices and not only the best way to fulfil the LCC’s objective. This contestation can even influence if LCC is adopted. In the second part of the research, the implications of practising LCC on LCM are explored. LCC is found to positively propel LCM in many ways e.g., by spreading the life cycle idea, but may lead to a narrower understanding of the term life cycle resulting in the sustainability focus of LCM being overridden. The article also discusses how the findings can be taken into consideration when researchers develop LCC methods and when industry practises LCC.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 3856
Author(s):  
Rebeka Kovačič Lukman ◽  
Vasja Omahne ◽  
Damjan Krajnc

When considering the sustainability of production processes, research studies usually emphasise environmental impacts and do not adequately address economic and social impacts. Toy production is no exception when it comes to assessing sustainability. Previous research on toys has focused solely on assessing environmental aspects and neglected social and economic aspects. This paper presents a sustainability assessment of a toy using environmental life cycle assessment, life cycle costing, and social life cycle assessment. We conducted an inventory analysis and sustainability impact assessment of the toy to identify the hotspots of the system. The main environmental impacts are eutrophication, followed by terrestrial eco-toxicity, acidification, and global warming. The life cycle costing approach examined the economic aspect of the proposed design options for toys, while the social assessment of the alternative designs revealed social impacts along the product life cycle. In addition, different options based on the principles of the circular economy were analysed and proposed in terms of substitution of materials and shortening of transport distances for the toy studied.


2018 ◽  
Vol 225 ◽  
pp. 05002
Author(s):  
Freselam Mulubrhan ◽  
Ainul Akmar Mokhtar ◽  
Masdi Muhammad

A sensitivity analysis is typically conducted to identify how sensitive the output is to changes in the input. In this paper, the use of sensitivity analysis in the fuzzy activity based life cycle costing (LCC) is shown. LCC is the most frequently used economic model for decision making that considers all costs in the life of a system or equipment. The sensitivity analysis is done by varying the interest rate and time 15% and 45%, respectively, to the left and right, and varying 25% of the maintenance and operation cost. It is found that the operation cost and the interest rate give a high impact on the final output of the LCC. A case study of pumps is used in this study.


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