Project

The reliability.space aims at improving the reliability prediction process and to increase the cost effectiveness of ESA space systems development programs. The project is comissioned and financed by the European Space Agency  under the name "NEW RELIABILITY PREDICTION METHODOLOGY AIMED AT SPACE APPLICATIONS".

The main technical objective of the study is the development of a new methodology for reliability prediction for space products aiming to overcome the problems and limitations of the methods and approaches currently used in practice. The final outcome of the study will be a handbook for reliability prediction in space applications, which will serve as an input for the development of a new ECSS standard.

Reliability goals are defined for most ESA projects and reliability predictions are performed at all design levels. The most widely used methodology by industry for reliability prediction is MIL-HDBK-217. This has become out-dated and has limitations due to the obsolescence of its part type failure rate prediction models and the database incompleteness. Moreover, current prediction models are mostly addressing random failures while a significant amount of in-orbit anomalies are not due to random failures and thus are not covered in current methods (e.g. design and/or manufacturing related failures).