Modeling reliability with a two-sided power distribution

ABSTRACT

Modeling the reliability of a system typically involves the piecewise combination of mathematically disparate functions covering distinct periods (e.g., decreasing, constant, and increasing time-dependent failure rates defining the traditional bathtub curve) in the life of an engineered system. This work explores the two-sided power distribution, a nonlinear extension of the triangular distribution, for describing failure time and rendering a statistically valid bathtub curve with a single probability density function. The parameters of the two-sided power distribution also provide some flexibility to describe decreasing and increasing failure rates with a single distribution that are not available with similar distributions.

KEYWORDS:

• bathtub curve
• failure time data
• hazard function
• reliability modeling
• two-sided power distribution

Funding

This work was supported in part by tuition assistance funding provided by the United States Air Force.