Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site
The rule is simple. For high-risk issues, the FMEA team needs to properly identify the cause(s) and associated failure mechanism(s). So, what exactly is a failure mechanism?
“Nature never breaks her own laws.” Leonardo da Vinci
Carl and Fred discussing the broad subject of risk, focusing on the concept of acceptable risk.
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Carl and Fred discussing the time it takes to do an FMEA, and how to shorten the in-meeting time, while increasing the quality of results.
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By prepopulating the highest priority functions, along with other selected information, the FMEA team can focus their efforts on the most important functions, and minimize in-meeting time. This is the last step in FMEA preparation. However, there are specific limitations to FMEA prepopulation that must be understood and adhered to.
“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”
Abraham Lincoln
Carl and Fred continuing to discuss the subject of integrating reliability within a very fast product development timeline.
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Carl and Fred discussing how the approach to achieving high reliability needs to change when operating in a fast-to-market product development process.
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“. . . not everything that can be counted counts” Albert Einstein
A key, but often missed, step in FMEA preparation is to identify and prioritize the functions that relate to the item being analyzed. These become candidate functions to be brought into the FMEA.
When creating a robust design, there is probably no more important consideration than identifying the correct parameters and associated values. A robust design is insensitive to anticipated variation and P-Diagram visually shows the relationship between what the system is designed to do, the anticipated noises the system will encounter and the correct parameters to achieve the desired outcome. P-Diagram can be an essential input to FMEA.
“Concern for man and his fate must always form the chief interest of all technical endeavors. Never forget this in the midst of your diagrams and equations.” Albert Einstein
Carl and Fred discussing the pitfalls of using Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF) as a metric for identifying reliability requirements.
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Carl and Fred discussing the subject of reliability allocation, how it is used and some of the pitfalls in application.
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Carl and Fred discuss the approach to building quality and reliability programs. Is it better to implement a disciplined approach or a more collaborative approach?
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Carl and Fred discussing how dependent we all have become on a multitude of devices to do our daily work, and the ramifications on our daily lives.
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Once you have identified the scope of the FMEA project, made the scope visible, it is time identify the FMEA team members. This article discusses the composition of the FMEA team, including why each member is needed, and the underlying reason for a cross-functional team.
“Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.” Helen Keller
Carl and Chris discussing the subjects of reliability engineering and reliability management. Are they generally the same subject with different focus areas, or are they based on entirely different bodies of knowledge?
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FMEA teams should agree to the ground rules that guide the analysis and the underlying assumptions that impact the entire FMEA. Failure to do so will add complexity and confusion to the resulting FMEA, and waste people’s time. Don’t miss this important step in FMEA preparation.
“Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won’t come in.” Isaac Asimov
