Customer Reviews

Practical Reliability Engineering, 3rd Edition, Revised

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

"Practical Reliability Engineering" by Patrick D.T. O'Connor, (with David Newton and Richard Bromley), John Wiley & sons, Chichester & New York, 1996. Third Edition Revised.

Back in the 1980s, I used the first edition of this book, and it was very helpful then. The third edition has been expanded to add a few chapters, including what I would call a "motivational" first chapter, entitled, "Introduction To Reliability Engineering", pages 1 to 16. This first chapter answers many of the questions that management used to ask, and to whom the final reply was, "We do Reliability because it is a contract item". Now, you can refer the managers to the first chapter.

The original edition once began with Chapter 2, "Reliability Mathematics", fundamental needed to understand Reliability; that chapter has been expanded in this edition, so much so that some has overflowed into Chapter 3, "Probability Plotting". Chapter 3 is a very complete chapter, being a compendium of the different kinds of probability paper, along with a short explanation of how to use the paper.

Interestingly enough, Chapter 5, "Reliability Prediction and Modeling" had a shipboard missile system reliability problem (pages 129-132) which was an explicit example of what we were attempting to portray on one contract. When the Naval Officers saw O' Connor's example, it made it so much easier for us as our work paralleled expert's work in the book's example. This alone was worth the price of the book. Chapter 10, "Software Reliability" is greatly expanded over the previous editions and is up-to-date with current best practices in the field. This new edition of the book is highly recommended as it provides a concise collection of reliability fundamentals. John Peter Rooney, ASQ Certified Reliability Engineer #2425.

I disagree fairly strongly with the previous reviewer. I'veused a number of texts in the study of systems reliability andreliability engineering and Mr. O'Connor's is the most user-friendly and real-world one that I have yet found. It is impossible to study this field without some involvement of mathematics and probabilistic and statistical functions. However, Mr. O'Connor makes these elements of the field both accessible and intuitively understandable. I rate this text as a very good introduction for those new to the field, and a good solid reference for those already practicing.

This is a great first book on the subject of reliability. Every reliability engineer should have a copy as well as engineering managers concerned about warranty costs. But the other reviewers wrote much the same. I have used this book even further.

I often refer to this book to get grounded on a point. It is a work that takes me to the answers I need quickly and then points to other experts via the many references at the end of each chapter. I have several copies and use the fourth edition now. I have reliability engineers who report to me and this book, among a few others, are what I require each staff member to obtain and become familiar with as part of their overall knowledge base.

A few years ago I wrote a book on improving product reliability with a colleague and we used the references a great deal to do our research work. This is not just a reliability book; it is a table of contents of the world of reliability.

I have used this book (2nd edition) for about 5 years. I find it extremely practical and useful. Mr. O'Conner concentrates on the background information that a Reliability Engineer uses on a daily basis. There is no way that I can answer all the questions the Engineering Staff asks. I find that almost always, I can look-up a concise and clear answer to a question, it refreshes my memory, and I can hit the ground running. This book lives next to 2 other books: The "Data Analysis Handbook" and "The Theory of Life Distributions". I hate to admit it, but I really can't see the need to know more than in contained in this trilogy about reliability and life statistics.

This book contains an excellent treatment of the mathematics for reliability analysis and prediction. It also has numerous, excellent examples that are particularly relevant to the Electronics Industry. I strongly would recommend this book to anyone involved in the instruction of Design for Six Sigma.

Heavy Electrical / Electronic focus. I only bought it because it was the required text for a Graduate Course, but hardly used it as I have other Reliability Engeineering texts (Modarres) which cover much of the same material in far more detail and with more clairity. I would only buy it if studying a course which closesly follows this text, otherwise, I would keep looking.

This book is very well written for a subject as wide as reliability engineering. I enjoyed all the chapters in this book other than software reliability which I did not read. This book also forms a good reference for ASQ CRE examination. However if you want to read in depth on any of the chapters covered, I will recommend relevent industry standards (like IEEE, MIL etc). This book in most cases will give an excellent start.

For students and engineers starting in the reliability field, this is a really good first book to have on your shelf. It covers most of the basic concepts in way that is easy to read and understand, at a reasonable price.

It is a well organized book, with all the topics full covered in a easy way to understand. Depite it is a subjets sometimes a little bored, I find this book very interesting to read.

I haven't read a book fully and actually I bought to select and analyze some specific chapters in it. As a result, i was quite impressed by density of knowledge shared by author (actually with submissions from other people as well). Books give you a lot of new ideas and strategies/techniques of sometimes revolutionary and quite new approaches to engineering and maintenance concepts. I would even called Reverse engineering.
I highly recommend it to everyone studying and interested in Engineering or other applied disciplines.
As for book quality and delivery, everything was perfect and on time!