ABSTRACT
Failures occur due to problems in the way a product is developed, produced, and distributed to customers. If a product is well designed and manufactured then it should last or provide effective usage longer than one produced at a lower quality level with an inferior design and poor selection of materials. So a product that has high durability will implicitly also have high conformance quality and reliability. Generally, failures that occur early during their usage are conformance related due to problems in their production, assembly, and distribution. Poor workmanship, impurities, and lack of homogeneity in the materials used cause these problems as well as process-related problems, such as improper sequencing and materials handling. Failures that occur later in the usage cycle are most often due to reliability problems that relate to the design. In all cases, it is very important that the failure characteristics are known before the product is placed on the market. In this chapter, the basic results for predicting and analyzing failures are presented.
