Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA)
Failure Modes and Effects Analysis is a powerful tool used to thoroughly review the components of a design or process, identify potential causes and consequences of failures, prioritize their importance, and develop countermeasures or design changes to avoid or reduce the effects of the failure. Although FMEA is used most commonly to analyze products and systems it also can be used to analyze processes of any type.
Severity. "The consequences of a failure mode. Severity considers the worst potential consequence of a failure, determined by the degree of injury, property damage, or system damage that could ultimately occur."
In FMEA, Failures are prioritized according to how serious their consequences are, how frequently they occur and how easily they can be detected. An FMEA also documents current knowledge and actions about the risks of failures, for use in continuous improvement. FMEA is used during the design stage with an aim to avoid future failures. Later it is used for process control, before and during ongoing operation of the process. Ideally, FMEA begins during the earliest conceptual stages of design and continues throughout the life of the product or service.
The purpose of the FMEA is to take actions to eliminate or reduce failures, starting with the highest-priority ones. It may be used to evaluate risk management priorities for mitigating known threat-vulnerabilities. FMEA helps select remedial actions that reduce cumulative impacts of life-cycle consequences (risks) from a systems failure (fault).
Failure modes and effects analysis (FMEA) is a step-by-step approach for identifying all possible failures in a design, a manufacturing or assembly process, or a product or service.
“Failure modes” means the ways, or modes, in which something might fail. Failures are any errors or defects, especially ones that affect the customer, and can be potential or actual.
“Effects analysis” refers to studying the consequences of those failures.
Failures are prioritized according to how serious their consequences are, how frequently they occur and how easily they can be detected. The purpose of the FMEA is to take actions to eliminate or reduce failures, starting with the highest-priority ones.