A computational intelligent approach to estimate the Weibull parameters
by Kouroush Jenab, Amir Kazeminia, Diane Suk-Ching Liu
International Journal of Industrial and Systems Engineering (IJISE), Vol. 6, No. 1, 2010

Abstract: Fitting probability distributions, like Weibull distribution to data related to electronic components, is an essential activity in warranty forecasting model and lifetime analysing. This paper presents an evolutionary statistical approach (ESA), which yields both accurate and robust parameter estimates of lifetime distribution function for two parameters Weibull. Almost all estimation methods produce accurate results for the large sample size; however, more care must be taken in the selection of the estimation methods for extremely small sample size. It is known, for example, maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) estimates of the shape parameter for the Weibull distribution are biased for small sample sizes and the effect can be increased depending on the amount of censoring. In the Weibull distribution, the scale and shape parameters are calculated as an evaluation function by minimising the product of sum of squared errors (SSE) on both XY axes. Using SSE, the least squares estimation (LSE) and real-coded genetic algorithm methods, a simulation is carried out to compare the quality of these approaches. The results show that the ESA is superior to LSE and real-coded genetic algorithm methods, specifically, for a small sample size of data related to electronic components.

Online publication date: Tue, 06-Jul-2010

The full text of this article is only available to individual subscribers or to users at subscribing institutions.

 
Existing subscribers:
Go to Inderscience Online Journals to access the Full Text of this article.

Pay per view:
If you are not a subscriber and you just want to read the full contents of this article, buy online access here.

Complimentary Subscribers, Editors or Members of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Industrial and Systems Engineering (IJISE):
Login with your Inderscience username and password:

Username:        Password:          Forgotten your password?

Want to subscribe?
A subscription gives you complete access to all articles in the current issue, as well as to all articles in the previous three years (where applicable). See our Orders page to subscribe.

If you still need assistance, please email subs@inderscience.com