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  • © 2004

Reliability Engineering

Theory and Practice

  • Design guidelines for reliability, maintainability, and software quality
  • Checklists for design reviews
  • More than 100 practice oriented examples
  • Based on over 30 years of industrial and academic experience

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Table of contents (8 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages I-XV
  2. Reliability Analysis During the Design Phase

    • Alessandro Birolini
    Pages 25-80
  3. Qualification Tests for Components and Assemblies

    • Alessandro Birolini
    Pages 81-113
  4. Maintainability Analysis

    • Alessandro Birolini
    Pages 114-136
  5. Reliability and Availability of Repairable Systems

    • Alessandro Birolini
    Pages 160-258
  6. Statistical Quality Control and Reliability Tests

    • Alessandro Birolini
    Pages 259-301
  7. Back Matter

    Pages 323-544

About this book

The large interest granted to this book made a 4th edition necessary. The structure of the book is unchanged, with its main part in Chapters 1 - 8 and self contained appendices Al - A5 on management aspects and A6 -A8 on basic probability theory, stochastic processes & statistics. Such a structure allows rapid access to practical results and a comprehensive introduction to the mathematical foundation of reliability theory. The content has been extended and reviewed. New models & considerations have been added to Appendix A 7 for stochastic processes (NHPP), Chapter 4 for spare parts provisioning, Chapter 6 for complex repairable systems (imperfect switching, incomplete coverage, items with more than two states, phased-mission systems, fault tolerant reconfigurable systems with reward and frequency / duration aspects, Monte Carlo simulation), and Chapters 7 & 8 for reliability data analysis. Some results come from a stay in 2001 as Visiting Fellow at the Institute of Advanced Study of the University of Bologna. Performance, dependability, cost, and time to market are key factors for today's products and services. However, failure of complex systems can have major safety consequences.

Reviews

From the reviews of the fourth edition:

Title: Reliability Engineering: Theory and Practice, Fourth Edition

Author: Prof. Dr. Alessandro Birolini

E-mail: birolini@emeritus.ethz.ch

Publisher: Springer-Verlag, 2004

Reference: ISBN 3-540-40287-X

Reviewer: Kenneth P. LaSala, Ph.D.

KPL Systems

Silver Spring, MD 20904-3323

Professor Birolini and Springer-Verlag recently have published the fourth edition of the excellent text entitled Reliability Engineering: Theory and Practice. The structure of the book remains basically unchanged from the previous editions:

Chapter 1 addresses the basic concepts associated with quality and reliability assurance of complex equipment and systems.

Chapters 2-8 focus on reliability, maintainability, and availability analysis and test, with Chapters 3,5, and 8 focusing on practical aspects. Chapter 2 covers reliabilityanalysis during the design and development phase and covers system structures and redundancies. It also covers reliability allocation (a favorite subject of the reviewer), mechanical reliability, failure mode analysis, and design reviews. Chapter 3 discusses qualification tests for components and assemblies. Included topics that are extremely useful but a bit off the chapter theme are basic component selection criteria such as environment, performance, technology, manufacturing, and reliability. Chapter 4, Maintainability Analysis, has added models and considerations for spare parts provisioning. The chapter also addresses maintenance concepts, design reviews, and predicting maintainability. Chapter 5 addresses many of the non-statistical design considerations such as derating, cooling, electromagnetic compatibility, and testability. Significantly, this chapter now includes design guidelines for software quality that address defect prevention, configuration management, software testing, and software quality growth models. Chapter 6 addresses redundancies and now addresses complex repairable systems in a variety of ways, including imperfect switching, incomplete coverage, and Monte Carlo simulation for rare events. Chapter 7 discusses statistical quality control, reliability tests, maintainability tests, accelerated testing, and goodness-of-fit tests. Chapter 8 covers quality and reliability assurance during the production phase. It includes screening and growth testing, although neither screening nor growth testing (especially the latter) should be restricted to the production phase.

Appendices A1-A5 address definition, standards, and program plans for the reliability assurance and management of complex systems. This is an important addition because it helps readers specify and achieve high reliability targets. Appendix A4 is particularly useful because it includes checklists for design reviews. Appendix A5 describes requirements for quality data reportingsystems.

Appendices A6-A8 address basic probability theory, stochastic processes, and statistics. Appendix A7 focuses on basic stochastic process theory and includes Markov, semi-Markov, and semi-regenerative processes. This appendix now includes new models that address non-homogeneous Poisson processes (NHPPs).

Appendix A9 includes statistical tables, Laplace transforms and probability paper samples.

All in all, Professor Birolini has given readers an excellent instructional tool and desktop reference. It is extremely well written. The span of topics makes the coverage of some topics necessarily brief. Professor Birolini presents much of the non-statistical information in a manner that could be understood easily by engineering and program managers as well as reliability experts. He discusses the statistical topics in the proper amount of detail to ensure at least a good basic understanding. Tables, illustrations, and examples amply support the text.However, one disadvantage for classroom use could be that there are no sets of problems to be worked for homework assignments.

The reviewer thanks the author for the opportunity to review this excellent book and recommends this book highly.

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"One of the key components of customer satisfaction (a pillar of the total quality management movement) is the reliability of a product. … This book is based on Birolini’s 30 years experience in this field both in industry and academia. … All in all, the book of Professor Birolini can be highly recommended. It is … written as a text book for those versed in maths and working in the field of RE, and as reference book for others including project managers." (Kasturi Narasimhan, The TQM Magazine, Vol. 17 (2), 2005)

Authors and Affiliations

  • Arrigo-Mosciano, Scandicci (FI), Tuscany, Italy

    Alessandro Birolini

  • Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zürich, Switzerland

    Alessandro Birolini

Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 74.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access