Practical Reliability Engineering (Hardcover)

by O'Connor (Author) "No one disputes the need for articles to be reliable..." (more)
Key Phrases: Monte Carlo, National Technical Information Service, United States (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"...Every engineer should read this book, as it is a subject often neglected..." (Quality World, January 2003)

"...I highly recommend the book...it is one of the best books in its class..." (Quality & Reliability Engineering International, Vol 21 (8), December 2005)

Product Description
Provides a comprehensive, up to date description of all the important methods for the design, development, manufacture and maintenance of reliable engineering products and systems. Fulfills the requirements of the qualifying examination in reliability engineering of the American Society for Quality (USA).

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 540 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 4 edition (July 9, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470844620
• ISBN-13: 978-0470844625
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 7.5 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #939,375 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Reliability Book., June 11, 2003

By	John P. Rooney "John" (Plymouth, MA USA-America's Hometown) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Practical Reliability Engineering (Paperback)

"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.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Another Opinion, May 1, 2000

By	John Mountjoy, USN Aircraft Escape Systems En... (North Carolina, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Practical Reliability Engineering, 3rd Edition, Revised (Hardcover)

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.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Book, August 23, 2000

By	Drew A. Hoelscher (Millington, Michigan United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Practical Reliability Engineering, 3rd Edition, Revised (Paperback)

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.