A new failure times model for one and two failure modes system: A Bayesian study with Hamiltonian Monte Carlo simulation

Abstract

This paper presents an additive Gompertz-Weibull (AGW) distribution, a four-parameter hybrid probability distribution, and its applications in reliability engineering. The failure rate (FR) function of the proposed model demonstrates an increasing trend and a variety of bathtub shapes with or without a low and yet long-stable segment, making it appropriate for modelling a wide variety of real-world problems. Some relationships between the AGW’s FR and its mean residual life functions are examined. For parameter estimation, maximum likelihood and Bayesian inferences are considered. For posterior simulations, we use Hamiltonian Monte Carlo to evaluate the Bayes estimators of the AGW parameters. We evaluate the performance of the proposed AGW model to that of other recent bathtub distributions constructed following the same approach on three failure time datasets. The first two datasets represent device failure times, while the third represents early cable-joint failure times, all with bathtub FR. For comparison, five parametric and nonparametric evaluation criteria and the fitted FR and mean residual life curves were employed. The results indicated that the AGW model would be the best choice for describing failure times, especially when the bathtub-shaped FR of the presented dataset exhibits its three segments.