THEORY OF RELIABILITY FOR COHERENT STRUCTURES.
Abstract
With the advent of very complex engineering designs such as those of high-speed computers or supersonic aircraft, it has become increasingly important to study the relationship between the functioning and failure of single components and the performance of the entire system. It is the aim of this paper to present, with complete proofs, some aspects of a mathematical theory dealing with such problems. It is assumed that there are only two states possible for every component of a system, as well as for the system itself: either it functions or it falls. When the system consists of n components, to each of them is ascribed a binary variable which indicates its state; similarly to the entire system is ascribed a binary indicator variable. When the design of a system is known, then the states of all n components determine the state of the system. It is furthermore assumed that the state of each component is decided by chance, so that the value actually assumed by the state variable is a binary random variable with the probability distribution; these random variables are totally independent. (Author)
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 20, 1965
- Accession Number
- AD0462482
Entities
People
- Z. W. Birnbaum
Organizations
- University of Washington