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Find all articles across all article series listed in reverse chronological order.
Dear friends, this is a quick overview of the Design for Relliability (DFR) strategy.
For details of the tools and techniques shown in the video, we are providing links to our videos Links to some related videos:
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True or False? Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) produces more than just a Proactive Maintenance Plan. In this short video, we explore the broader benefits of RCM! Discover how a Facilitated Working Group approach empowers equipment experts to identify vulnerabilities, known as Failure Modes, and develop effective solutions that go beyond traditional maintenance strategies. From new operating procedures to equipment redesigns, RCM can drive meaningful improvements across your organization.
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Most customers aren’t happy with products that break down a lot.
Product unreliability has been behind a lot of losses, cancellations and bankruptcies. A great example is the Yugo – a small, inexpensive car from the former Yugoslavia that gained notoriety in the 1980s and 1990s. It was about half as expensive as similar cars when it hit the US market. And despite a lot of initial ‘excited’ purchasers, it simply stopped selling when people realized how comically unreliable and unsafe it was.
Now there is Rivian. When Rivian burst onto the electric vehicle (EV) scene, it quickly gained a devoted following. The Rivian R1T truck and R1S SUV were praised for their funky designs and innovative features. Owners and enthusiasts love the company’s approach to off-road lifestyles, reinforced by early partnerships with Amazon and promises of building a nationwide ‘outdoor-centric’ charging network.
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Generally speaking, pushing value through functional silos usually creates inefficiencies, low buy-in, and a lack of ownership. Resistance to change is almost guaranteed, not to mention the problems caused by missed or poor communication. The same applies to reliability engineering activities during product or process development, which often face strong resistance from design teams, to say the least.
In my 12 years of reliability experience, I’ve seen that reliability engineering is often viewed as just another function — another group asking designers to do extra work because their “baby” (design) is “ugly.” This mindset exists largely because traditional engineering education focuses more on how things function given the boundary conditions, not how they degrade, specifically, how they degrade over time. Let me explain.
Of the many constructive soft skills, active listening is surely one of the most helpful in the design thinking process. More than just listening to collect information, active listening is a mindset that fosters empathy for the speaker. In business and engineering, it’s our customer that’s speaking. Active listening seeks to understand not only the other person’s words, but also their attitudes and motivations.
For many people, even the idea of “being a better listener” seems ludicrous. Once you’re listening, how can you listen better? It’s like swallowing better or breathing better. [But the truth is, you can.] Even the best listeners periodically fall into a handful of traps that obstruct their understanding of their employer’s, customer’s, and loved one’s words.
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I got this question the other day. The person knew about the NoMTBF campaign. They didn’t quite understand why it was a big deal, especially for me, to avoid MTBF.
The tiff between MTBF and myself is not personal. The metric has not been a part of my work or caused any significant problems for me personally.
It has caused problems that have caused problems for my enjoyment of products and systems though. It has lead to poor decisions by many organizations that create items I and you use on a regular basis.
We can do better than to settle with the use of MTBF in our own work or in the work of those around us. Here are 10 reasons I recommend you avoid using MTBF.
Meantime between failures MTF is a widely used reliability metric in various Industries, particularly in electronics and manufacturing. While it can be a valuable tool in certain scenarios, its misuse or misinterpretation can lead to costly mistakes. Let’s explore when MTBF is applicable and when it might be inappropriate to use.
By understanding when to use MTB and when to seek alternative methods, organizations can make more informed decisions about product design, maintenance strategies, and reliability improvements, ultimately leading to better products and more satisfied customers.
[Read more…]Find the fortune maintenance can make for your business. Unfortunately, maintenance people get praise when they repair breakdowns. This embeds and promotes a culture of equipment failure acceptance in a business. Maintenance must be used to prevent equipment failures, not fix them. If you want to start a culture of failure elimination in your business you have to start putting a money value on the breakdowns prevented by Maintenance. You have to start praising and recognising them for the breakdowns they didn’t let happen. Maintenance needs to be praised and glorified for the money it makes a company, not singled out for the money it spends.
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Is climate change humanity’s greatest ever risk management failure?
The Guardian newspaper
Climate change. Global warming. These are the ‘new normal’ or the ultimate ‘Horsemen of the Apocalypse’. U.S. intelligence report said:
Read more: Climate Change or Global Extinction?“Global environmental and ecological degradation, as well as climate change, are likely to fuel competition for resources, economic distress, and social discontent through 2019 and beyond. Climate hazards such as extreme weather, higher temperatures, droughts, floods, wildfires, storms, sea level rise, soil degradation, and acidifying oceans are intensifying, threatening infrastructure, health, and water and food security.”
Risk likelihoods as well as direct risk consequences are increasing. Extreme heat is impacting global food supply chains, housing near the ocean, increases in cancer, and other factors.
Are you a denier? According to a recent report, there’s a 95% likelihood that VUCANs are the drivers of climate change through carbon dioxide emission.
OK, is human extinction too strong of a prediction? The New York Times said:
“Humans are transforming Earth’s natural landscapes so dramatically that as many as one million plant and animal species are now at risk of extinction, posing a dire threat to ecosystems that people all over the world depend on for their survival .”
Story: You may be a green believer or even an evangelist. Or, you may be a denier. It really doesn’t matter.
We’re in a global heating environment and changing political environment. So, pay attention to sustainability. I was a green skeptic until I saw first-hand major environmental changes occurring over a few years. I catch & release salmon on the Columbia River in Oregon, USA., which is a beautiful and pristine environment. The problem is over the last 30 years, salmon fishing changed. Fewer fish. Smaller fish. Shorter fishing season. Not good. As an engineer, I thought maybe we were going through a macro weather cycle from cold to warm.
Work Lesson Earned: Climate is now directly tied to work and salaries. More people see climate change impacting job retention, promotional opportunities, and recruitment. A recent survey concluded 74% of executives say climate change poses risks to their job security. How does climate change impact or may impact your work? Are there any opportunities for you? As traditional industries adapt to the changing environment, have you considered working in a green business? You’re saving humankind. You’re having fun. You’re doing good. You’re saving the planet.
Today’s Gremlin – “Assumptions” can get a planner or a supervisor into a lot of trouble. You might be very knowledgeable and have great faith in your trades-persons, but assuming they know what you know, can be dangerous. There’s always discussion about “how much detail” to put in a maintenance job plan. It should be safe to assume your trades know how to perform those basic skills that earned them their trade. But it is not safe to assume they are familiar enough with your equipment and operation to use those skills correctly.
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True or False? Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) must be applied to all assets.
False!
In this video, we explore the flexibility of Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) and how it can be tailored to your specific needs. RCM doesn’t have to be applied to every asset; instead, your analysis scope should be driven by your goals. Whether you focus on a single piece of equipment, a specific component, or a select group of machines, the approach can vary. Join me as we debunk the myth that RCM must be applied to everything.
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Dear friends, we are happy to release our 91st technical video on XOR Gate occasionally used in Fault Tree Analysis (FTA). In this video, Hemant Urdhwareshe, Fellow of ASQ, explains the basic concept of XOR gate, the related probability calculation and an illustrative example.
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What drives your organization’s decisions, behaviors, and success? It’s your values. In this video, George Williams, Founder and CEO of Reliability X, dives into the importance of values as a building block within the Culture domain of Ramesh Gulati’s Maintenance and Reliability Best Practices (MRBP) Framework. Values are the core principles that guide behaviors, shape culture, and ensure alignment with your mission and vision. From integrity to customer focus, learn how defining and living your values can transform your organization’s culture and drive long-term success. Do you have questions about values, culture, or the MRBP Framework? Reach out to us at ask@reliabilityx.com or visit www.reliabilityx.com for more resources. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and hit the notification bell to stay updated on our latest videos!
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In the world of reliability engineering, few tools are as powerful – or as misunderstood – as Weibull analysis. It is a statistical tool, which can turn people ‘off’ straight away, as we can immediately leap to a list of equations and tables of numbers that we need to memorize and embrace. But Weibull analysis is different. You actually don’t need equations.
Check out the chart below, which is called a ‘Weibull plot.’ The different shapes and colours representing the failures of different components can tell us so many things without having to evaluate a single equation.
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I usually write articles about topics I personally struggled to understand from the sources available to us such as books, online resources, and so on. I believe most technical concepts are fairly straightforward at their core, but the way we express ideas and translate our understanding into writing often makes them harder for others to grasp. That’s an area where we can all continue to improve.
As part of that journey, my goal with the Breaking Bad for Reliability newsletter is to be a communicator of Reliability Engineering principles, and I am doing this mainly for two categories of people: [Read more…]
