An effective and systematic design FMEA approach

An innovative approach has been developed to objectively and systematically identify failure causes of a product in real time, using a reliability physics methodology. It is intended to overcome problems associated with traditional design FMEAs, which can be inefficient in aiding the design process in a timely fashion. The approach is based on the premise that, at the most fundamental level, failure causes are a result of a manageable number of predictable processes. These processes result when combinations of material type, stress and conditions occur. A knowledge base forms the basis for this methodology and is in the form of a multidimensional matrix that relates element type, stresses, conditions, processes, resulting stresses, resulting conditions, and failure modes. A software tool has been developed that enables the analysis based on rudimentary data elements of a design that are entered by the user. It then generates output tables that can be used by the system designer or reliability engineer for a variety of purposes that require the hypothesizing of possible failure causes, including optimizing the design, developing reliability test plans, and root cause analysis.