Reliability engineering
Faults, failures, availability and reliability

Overview

Reliability is the probability that a system or component will function within specified limits for a specified period of time under specified conditions. Reliability engineering consists of estimating the probability of failure of different components, analyzing component failure modes and examining the manner in which they can lead to failure of the service provided by a system. Metrics analyzed include the mean time to failure (MTTF), mean time to repair (MTTR) and MTBF (mean time between failures).

In these slides, we give an overview of the role of reliability engineering in system safety and the way in which it is integrated into risk analysis.

This submodule is a part of the risk analysis module.

Course material

	Overview of reliability engineering Lecture slides (PDF)
	Python notebook with exercises in reliability calculations View Python notebook online Download Python notebook Run notebook in MyBinder Run notebook in Google Colab

Other resources

We recommend the following sources of further information on this topic:

• Wired.com article Why Things Fail: From Tires to Helicopter Blades, Everything Breaks Eventually from 2010
• The book Reliability of Safety-Critical Systems: Theory and Applications by Marvin Rausand, 2014, Wiley, which includes both theory and practical exercises.
• The book Probability, Statistics, and Reliability for Engineers and Scientists by Bilal M. Ayyub and Richard H. McCuen, 2011, CRC Press.
• The book An Introduction to the Basics of Reliability and Risk Analysis by Enrico Zio, 2007, World Scientific Publishing.