When engineers have limited resources with which to improve system reliability, they often turn to component importance measurement. By using block diagrams to identify those individual components that most contribute to reliability, engineers can adjust a system to prioritize these components, thereby optimizing improvement efforts.
In this article, authors Peng Liu and Leo Wright explore two alternative methods for evaluating component importance that are better suited for aging systems. By carefully examining the formulation of these alternatives, the authors weigh the comparative advantages and limitations of component integrated importance and conditional Birnbaum component importance.