Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site
Our manufacturing friends are approaching us with a problem.
They want to test the product during manufacturing. The way the product is currently designed doesn’t let them do this, or not easily.
Can we make a design change so they can test?
Imagine that they’re coming to us with this question before we’ve completed the design. Can they really see the future?
Perhaps, with strategic use of FMEA. We talk through a scenario of how to do it.
We’re heading into pilot production.
We’ve got to finish those design specs and engineering drawings!
Before you pass it along, have you identified what features are critical? Does it align with managing risk? And are you communicating that effectively on your specs and drawings?
Creating design specs is an important part of engineering design. We review a way to choose critical design features, based on risk.
We can get stuck when trying to discover a solution to a problem.
We talk about a Nine Windows tool and TRIZ – more thought-provoking methods that we can use to get unstuck and move on to the next step.
We can get stuck when trying to discover a solution to a problem. Sometimes it helps to expand our thinking into other avenues. We can reframe our problem within its contradictions. What is it not?
We review an Is/Is-Not Matrix: how it’s built, its purpose, and how it can help us.
We’re uncovering risks during our new product development, about our design. How do we manage risks? What options do we have?
There are at least 5 options we can take to manage risks. We talk about each, and how quality and reliability methods and techniques may help us with the next steps to be able to make decisions with our team.
As a design engineer, you’re tasked with translating vague customer statements into something technical and measurable. And you also need to identify what requirements are important: filtering the “must meet” requirements against the “should have” requirements. And, finally, you need to do this with your cross-functional team.
What if you miss something important?
It’s difficult. There is a method that we can use. Let’s talk about the House of Quality and how you can use it no matter where you work.
If you have quality friends, you may have heard of Gemba. What is Gemba and can it help with product design?
Gemba is an ideology.
And, yes, it can help with product design!
We explore how and talk about why you might want to adopt the term “Gemba” for product design engineering.
“A Chat with Cross Functional Experts” is a Quality during Design interview series. Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team for new product development. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they’re involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
Today we talk with Gabor Szabo. Gabor is an engineering and data professional with experience in numerous industries, including the medical device and automotive industries. In his current role a Sr. Principal Engineer of Operations Excellence, he works with various cross-functional teams on validating new processes and products, launching new products, helps them diagnose and solve technical problems. He hosts the Critical Talks podcast. He also develops software and builds data products in R.
Reliability Engineering isn’t just about assessments. It’s about providing information to make decisions. How does reliability engineering affect design?
We answer all the questions from the classical Kipling Method:
FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) is a tool we can use to help us investigate complaints from the field. The FMEA is a matrix of the collective team knowledge about the risks of this product, so it’s a valuable source in our investigation about what’s going on in the field.
We talk through how to go about using FMEA for complaint investigation and what we can do with the information.
Many presentation books and guides seem to focus on presentations that we see at conferences, for sales pitches, or for executive meetings about business topics.
They don’t seem applicable to the technical design reviews that engineers host.
But they do relate.
We talk about just 3 ways that we can change how we can plan technical design reviews, using some of the principles of presentations.
This interview focuses on product design from a marketing viewpoint, including sales and commercial operations.
“A Talk with Cross Functional Experts” is a Quality during Design interview series. Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team for new product development. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they’re involved and work with product design engineering teammates.
Today we speak with Laura Krick, a VP for a global medical device manufacturer (who has, since our interview, been promoted to Chief Commercial Officer – congratulations!). She’s involved in marketing, sales, and commercial operations for new product development.
We talk about these topics:
Listen to a Chat with Laura. Gain a different perspective and get actionable advice.
FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) is a super-tool for a team, especially when developing concepts and requirements. Done early, iteratively, and treated as a “living” analysis helps teams throughout development and beyond.
Some people seem to either love it or hate it. I don’t have a strong reaction like that, but I do think it can be a valuable option for teamwork and design – so much so that I’ve dedicated a few episodes to it (including this one). We touch on some of the objections to it, too.
FMEAs can have different focuses and can be built to suit the goals of the team. There are two FMEAs, in particular, that can be done in the early concept stages of development: “use” UFMEA and “systems design” DFMEA.
When defining design inputs and specifications, what does a design engineer need to consider about the test and measure capability? What are the typical ways that we assess the variability that a test or measurement introduces into our result?
Reliability engineers may suggest environmental stress tests. There are many types of tests in an RE’s toolbox. We compare two types of commonly known tests that are used for design: ALT vs. HALT. What are the important distinctions between these two methods? What value do they each bring to design engineering? And how do they fit into other reliability test methods?