The present application relates to the field of
power cable engineering, and discloses a low-cost repair decision method for a cable, which comprises the following steps: on-line monitoring the insulation state of the cable by a
spread spectrum time domain reflection method, recording the end-of-
life time of the cable, collecting the end-of-
life time of a plurality of different cables; establishing a cable
reliability model according to the Weibull
distribution law of the end-of-
life time of the plurality of different cables; establishing an average cost rate model according to a preventive repair probability, a
failure probability, a preventive repair cost and a failure repair cost; introducing a chaos factor into a
mathematical model of a chimpanzee optimization
algorithm, and optimizing and solving a target function by a
chaotic chimpanzee optimization
algorithm according to the preventive repair cost and the failure repair cost to obtain a minimum average cost rate, and outputting a best maintenance period and a repair threshold of the cable. The present application can output the best maintenance period and the repair threshold of the cable under the condition of ensuring the reliability of the cable, and realize a low-cost repair decision.