PFMEA
A tool for proactively evaluating processes and/or products and identifying ways to prevent defects
Summary
There are many forms of Failure Mode Effect
Analysis, including
Process Failure Mode Effect Analysis (PFMEA),
Failure Mode Effect and Criticality Analysis (FMECA)
System/Concept Failure Mode Effect Analysis
(S/CFMEA),
Design Failure Mode Effect Analysis (DFMEA).
This should be used in the planning phase to be
most effective. It allows the project to proactively
identify potential problems and implement
avoidance or mitigation strategies to minimize any
potential adverse effect on the program.
This approach most often involves multi-discipline
teams, sometimes with customer involvement ,
who will use techniques such as brainstorming to
identify all the potential areas of failure for a
product or process. From this data the team can
then identify the major risks to the product or
program and can develop the most appropriate
mitigation and/or avoidance strategies.
Failure modes may be grouped based on criteria
such as systems or sub-systems.
Each Failure mode is evaluated in terms of the
potential impact (Severity), the likelihood of it
occurring (Occurrence) and the degree of difficulty
to detect (Detection). This produces a Risk Priority
Number (RPN) which can be used to prioritize
action planning
1
Process Steps
Identify all the activities in the process
which is being reviewed
For each activity identify all the things
that could go wrong
For each thing that could go wrong
identify the effects that would arise
from that potential failure
Calculate the SOD#
Severity should the event occur
Probability of the Occurrence
Ability to Detect the event
Produce plans to minimize the
potential; for occurrence, or to mitigate
should the event occur.