Testing or Fault-Finding for Reliability Growth: A Missile Destructive-Test Example

A new piece of equipment has been purchased in a lot of size m . Some of the items can be used in destructive testing before the item is put into use. Testing uncovers faults which can be removed from the remaining pieces of equipment in the lot. If t õ m pieces of equipment are tested, then those that remain, mt Å m 0 t , have reduced fault incidence and are more reliable than initially, but mt may be too small to be useful, or than is desirable. In this paper models are studied to address this question: given the lot size m , how to optimize by choice of t the effectiveness of the pieces of equipment remaining after the test. The models used are simplistic and illustrative; they can be straightforwardly improved. q 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.* Naval Research Logistics 44: 623–637, 1997