New method for fuzzy system reliability analysis

Abstract

This paper presents a new method for fuzzy system reliability analysis based on fuzzy time series and the alpha-cuts arithmetic operations of fuzzy numbers, where we allow the reliabilities of the components of a system at different times t (t =...,0, 1, 2,...) to be represented by different membership functions. Because the proposed method allows the reliabilities of the components of a system at different times t to have different membership functions, it is more flexible than the ones presented in Chen (1994), Cheng and Mon (1993), and Singer (1990). Furthermore, because the proposed method uses the simple alpha-cuts arithmetic operations of fuzzy numbers rather than the complicated nonlinear programming techniques mentioned in Mon and Cheng (1994), it is simpler in calculating fuzzy system reliability than the one presented in that paper.