Calculation of Failure Probability of Series and Parallel Systems for Imprecise Probability

Abstract

In the situation that unit failure probability is imprecise when calculation the failure probability of system, classical probability method is not applicable, and the analysis result of interval method is coarse. To calculate the reliability of series and parallel systems in above situation, D-S evidence theory was used to represent the unit failure probability. Multi-sources information was fused, and belief and plausibility function were used to calculate the reliability of series and parallel systems by evidential reasoning. By this mean, lower and upper bounds of probability distribution of system failure probability were obtained. Simulation result shows that the proposed method is preferable to deal with the imprecise probability in reliability calculation, and can get additional information when compare with interval analysis method.

Reliability of internal logistics distribution in a hospital

“…In series means that all components must be operative for the system to work. As the number of components increases, the reliability decreases rapidly (Suo et al , 2012). Assuming an independence between failures, the reliability of the system will be calculated using the equation 4.…”