Reliability Growth In Product Design And Test

Historically, the reliability growth process has been thought of, and treated as, a reactive approach to growing reliability based on failures "discovered" during testing or, most unfortunately, once a system/product has been delivered to a customer. As a result, many reliability growth models are predicated on starting the reliability growth process at test time "zero", with some initial level of reliability (usually in the context of a time-based measure such as Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF)). Time "zero" represents the start of testing, and the initial reliability of the test item is based on its inherent design. The problem with this approach, still predominant today, is that it ignores opportunities to grow reliability during the design of a system or product, i.e., opportunities to go into reliability growth testing with a higher initial inherent reliability at time zero. In addition to the traditional approaches to reliability growth during test, this book explores the activities and opportunities that can be leveraged to promote and achieve reliability growth during the design phase of the overall system life cycle. The ability to do so as part of an integrated, proactive design environment has significant implications for developing and delivering reliable items quickly, on time and within budget. This book offers new definitions of how failures can be characterized, and how those new definitions can be used to develop metrics that will quantify how effective a Design for Reliability (DFR) process is in (1) identifying failure modes and (2) mitigating their root failure causes. Reliability growth can only occur in the presence of both elements.

At an early stage of the development, the design teams should ask questions such as, "How reliable will my product be?" "How reliable should my product be?" And, "How frequently does the product need to be repaired / maintained?" To answer these questions, the design team needs to develop an understanding of how and why their products fails; then, make only those changes to improve reliability while remaining within cost budget. The body of available literature may be separated into three distinct categories: "theory" of reliability and its associated calculations; reliability analysis of test or field data – provided the data is well behaved; and, finally, establishing and managing organizational reliability activities. The problem remains that when design engineers face the question of design for reliability, they are often at a loss. What is missing in the reliability literature is a set of practical steps without the need to turn to heavy statistics. Executing Design for Reliability Within the Product Life Cycle provides a basic approach to conducting reliability-related streamlined engineering activities, balancing analysis with a high-level view of reliability within product design and development. This approach empowers design engineers with a practical understanding of reliability and its role in the design process, and helps design team members assigned to reliability roles and responsibilities to understand how to deploy and utilize reliability tools. The authors draw on their experience to show how these tools and processes are integrated within the design and development cycle to assure reliability, and also to verify and demonstrate this reliability to colleagues and customers.

A high percentage of defense systems fail to meet their reliability requirements. This is a serious problem for the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD), as well as the nation. Those systems are not only less likely to successfully carry out their intended missions, but they also could endanger the lives of the operators. Furthermore, reliability failures discovered after deployment can result in costly and strategic delays and the need for expensive redesign, which often limits the tactical situations in which the system can be used. Finally, systems that fail to meet their reliability requirements are much more likely to need additional scheduled and unscheduled maintenance and to need more spare parts and possibly replacement systems, all of which can substantially increase the life-cycle costs of a system. Beginning in 2008, DOD undertook a concerted effort to raise the priority of reliability through greater use of design for reliability techniques, reliability growth testing, and formal reliability growth modeling, by both the contractors and DOD units. To this end, handbooks, guidances, and formal memoranda were revised or newly issued to reduce the frequency of reliability deficiencies for defense systems in operational testing and the effects of those deficiencies. "Reliability Growth" evaluates these recent changes and, more generally, assesses how current DOD principles and practices could be modified to increase the likelihood that defense systems will satisfy their reliability requirements. This report examines changes to the reliability requirements for proposed systems; defines modern design and testing for reliability; discusses the contractor's role in reliability testing; and summarizes the current state of formal reliability growth modeling. The recommendations of "Reliability Growth" will improve the reliability of defense systems and protect the health of the valuable personnel who operate them.

This book integrates key tools and processes into a comprehensive program for developing more robust and reliable technology-based products. Drawing on their extensive product development experience, the authors present a complete process for ensuring product performance throughout the entire lifecycle, from understanding customers’ needs through manufacturing and post-launch support. The authors begin by presenting broad insights and high-level strategies for improving product quality. Next, they demonstrate how to implement robustness and reliability strategies that complement existing governance and decision processes. A section on tools and methods shows how to institutionalize best practices and apply them consistently. Finally, they tie strategies, decisions, and methods together through a case study project. Product developers will learn how to Understand critical drivers of value in technology products, including reliability and durability Implement a process model and roadmap for improving reliability and robustness Increase robustness early in development, leading to shorter cycle times in later phases Improve the stability of production performance under stress conditions Assess both organizational and process capabilities for delivering robust and reliable products Understand and manage customer-driven requirements Use tools including descriptive and inferential statistics and DOE-based empirical models Managers will understand expectations for Design concepts supported by rigorous analyses of alternatives Products and processes delivering higher value to customers Products with higher reliability and longer useful lives Product processes with lower costs and higher capabilities Development projects having shorter, more predictable cycle times Readers are introduced to many thought leaders whose writings can be sources of further learning. This book is a valuable resource for anyone responsible for delivering reliable, profitable technology products, including general managers, program managers, engineers, scientists, and reliability and quality professionals.

Today's marketplace demands product reliability. At the same time, it places ever-increasing demands on products that push the limits of their performance and their functional life, and it does so with the expectation of lower per-unit product costs. To meet these demands, product design now requires a focused, streamlined, concurrent engineering process that will produce a product at the lowest possible cost in the least amount of time. Design for Reliability provides a systematic approach to the design process that is sharply focused on reliability and firmly based on the physics of failure. It imparts an understanding of how, why, and when to use the wide variety of reliability engineering tools available and offers fundamental insight into the total design cycle. Applicable from the idea phase of the product development cycle through product obsolescence, Design for Reliability (DfR) concepts integrated with reliability verification and analytical physics form a coherent stage gate/phase design process that helps ensure that a product will meet customers' reliability objectives. Whether you are a high-volume manufacturer of consumer items or a low volume producer of military commodities, your goal is the same: to bring a product to market using a process focused on designing out or mitigating potential failure modes prior to production release. Readers of Design for Reliability will learn to meet that goal and move beyond solidifying a basic offering to the marketplace to creating a true competitive advantage.

As an overview of reliability performance and specification in new product development, Product Reliability is suitable for managers responsible for new product development. The methodology for making decisions relating to reliability performance and specification will be of use to engineers involved in product design and development. This book can be used as a text for graduate courses on design, manufacturing, new product development and operations management and in various engineering disciplines.

Traditionally, the way to test a product's reliability was to build it--and then try to break it. As systems and technologies improved, TAAF (Test, Analyze and Fix) methodologies were developed and adopted. In today's global economy, with its short, technologically-intense product life cycles, TAAF cannot suffice. Reliability can no longer be a step or a series of steps in product development; it is something that needs to be acknowledged up front and built into the product from its very conception. Reliability, in other words, must be 'designed in.' Product developers now have many tools--software and hardware--at their disposal for building reliability in from the get go. From the organizational point of view, what better way to design in reliability than to make designers themselves responsible for the reliability of their designs? As "Mike Silverman" explains in "How Reliable is Your Product?," this is why the role of the reliability engineer is changing to one of mentor. Product developers are now responsible for going out and finding the best testing tools and then training the designers on their use, so that designers factor and build in reliability at every stage of product design. Mike has focused on reliability throughout his 25-year career, and has observed the position of reliability in the organization evolve. In this book, he condenses his expertise and experience into a volume of immense practical worth to the engineering and engineering management communities including designers, manufacturing engineers and reliability/quality engineers. Among other things, Mike discusses how reliability fits, or should fit, within the product design cycle. He provides a high-level overview of reliability techniques available to engineers today. He lucidly discusses the design of experiments and the role of failure management. With case studies and narratives from personal experience, Mike discusses optimal ways to utilize different reliability techniques. He highlights common errors of judgment, missteps and sub-optimal decisions that are often made within organizations on the path to total reliability. With"How Reliable is Your Product?" "Mike Silverman" has delivered what few have done before--a comprehensive yet succinct overview of the field of reliability engineering and testing. Engineers and engineering managers will find much in this book of immediate, practical value.

The design and manufacture of reliable products is a major challenge for engineers and managers. This book arms technical managers and engineers with the tools to compete effectively through the design and production of reliable technology products.

Leading the way in this field, the Encyclopedia of Quantitative Risk Analysis and Assessment is the first publication to offer a modern, comprehensive and in-depth resource to the huge variety of disciplines involved. A truly international work, its coverage ranges across risk issues pertinent to life scientists, engineers, policy makers, healthcare professionals, the finance industry, the military and practising statisticians. Drawing on the expertise of world-renowned authors and editors in this field this title provides up-to-date material on drug safety, investment theory, public policy applications, transportation safety, public perception of risk, epidemiological risk, national defence and security, critical infrastructure, and program management. This major publication is easily accessible for all those involved in the field of risk assessment and analysis. For ease-of-use it is available in print and online.