Track 1 Session 3
1:10 to 2:20 p.m. Wednesday April 11, 2007

Reliability Engineering: Are We Really Making Progress?

Notwithstanding the development and use of reliability engineering practices by organizations, it is not uncommon to observe many instances of low reliability in products and systems. This presentation discusses possible reasons for the apparent failure of reliability engineering, especially as practised by the defence industry. It argues that incorrect practices are often applied, frequently performed by incorrect departments in the organization and at the incorrect time during the product or system life cycle. The differences in approach to reliability engineering as followed by the defence and commercial industries, especially as far as electronic product development is concerned, are discussed. It argues that the defence industry is placing too much emphasis on the quantification of reliability as performance requirement. This focus necessitates the continued use of incorrect and misleading industry standard practices, especially for reliability specification, prediction and demonstration. Commercial industries follow an approach that rejects the accounting activities of specification, prediction and demonstration in favour of engineering activities. These activities include well-known techniques such as FMEA and FTA, thermal and derating analysis, and new techniques such as HALT and HASS.

Key Words: Reliability Engineering, Reliability Accounting, FMEA, FTA, HALT, HASS