Military Handbook- Reliability Growth Management

Benefits of Reliability Growth Management

• The initial prototypes for a complex system with major technological advances will invariably have significant reliability and performance deficiencies that could not be foreseen in the early design stage. The prototypes, therefore are subjected to a development testing program to surface problems so that improvements in system design can be made. The ensuing system reliability and performance characteristics will depend on the number and effectiveness of these fixes. The ultimate goal of the development test program is to meet the system reliability and performance requirements. Experience has shown that programs which rely simply on a final demonstrate on by itself to determine compliance with the reliability requirements do not, in many cases, achieve the reliability objectives with the allocated resources. Emphasis ‘on reliability performance prior to the final demonstration could substantially increase the chance of meeting these objectives. This can be accomplished by the utilization of reliability growth management. This involves setting interim reliability goals to be met during the development testing program, and the necessary allocation and reallocation of resources to attain these goals. A comprehensive approach to reliability growth management throughout the development program consists of planning, evaluating and controlling the growth process.