Maintenance is an essential part of daily life in The Netherlands. This is reflected in the economic importance that maintenance has: € 400 billion of invested capital, an annual cost of € 18 billion and more than 150,000 workplaces.
In practice, maintenance is often carried out on the basis of empirical approaches and experiences from the past. As a result, maintenance is a static process, which currently heavily relies on the empirical date. That is why a catch-up in terms of efficiency and effectiveness must be made. This requires the right awareness among both the designer of the system as well the designer of the maintenance process regarding the physical principles behind the necessity of doing maintenance. Therefore, the EngD programme Maintenance educates technological designers who are capable to design efficient and effective maintenance processes from a multidisciplinary perspective. By addressing both technical and operations aspects during the EngD programme, a necessary, clear (however missing) link is established between these two fields of expertise.
Examples of designs include:
- The redesign of the texturing process in steel mills;
- A decision tool for the determination of failure mechanism;
- The redesign of a butterfly valve with reduced operating torque based on a physical model including degradation of material;
- The development of efficient monitoring strategies enabling condition-based maintenance.
The programme
The postgraduate EngD programme combines academic research in an industrial context with training modules in a range of related subjects. It involves course work and ultimately results in a design project carried out in the industry.
The two-year programme at the University of Twente comprises three main components: professional development (6-10 EC), deepening and broadening courses (> 45 EC) and a technological design project at a company (> 60 EC). The educational component and the design project can be scheduled in parallel or sequentially (here flexibility is key). For each EngD trainee, the educational programme is tailored to the specific design project, which will be realised for the company.
Graduates of the two-year EngD program will have a clear added value compared to MSc graduates, especially in the area of design skills in multidisciplinary civil engineering issues.
For more information about the EngD programme in Maintenance, please see our website or contact our programme coordinator:
Coordinator: Prof.dr.ir. D.J. Schipper
E-mail: mt-pdeng@utwente.nl
Website: www.utwente.nl/pdeng/en/mt
Telephone: + 31 (0)53 489 2469
More information
Learn more about this programme and how to apply by visiting the EngD Maintenance website.