Application of Linear Programming to Optimize the Cost-Benefit of an IVHM System

The cost-benefit analysis is one of the key decision aspects regarding the investment on IVHM systems especially for aerospace applications where the evaluation of the impacts of such systems on costs, safety and weight are critical for the vehicle operation during its lifecycle. This paper presents the application of linear programming to select and to quantify how many components an IVHM system should consider in order to maximize the total value that it delivers. This approach advantage is that it uses an exact algorithm, that guarantees the optimal solution given the inputs provided by the user. The formulation shows how the technical value of an IVHM solution can be evaluated taking into account key aspects for aerospace platforms such as weight, reliability and bus capacity restrictions through a linear integer programming model solved using the branch-and-bound method. The results show that the method selects the equipment and quantifies the number of components that need to be monitored in order to maximize the cost-benefit relationship.