Evaluation the reliability of indeterminate truss structure by matrix-based system reliability method

Several approaches have been proposed to estimate the failure probability of engineering systems, such as Monte Carlo Simulation (MCS), First-Order Reliability Method(FORM) and Second-Order Reliability Method (SORM), Jointly Distributed Random Variables Method (JDRV). Each method have its advantages and disadvantages, some ofthese method are only able to calculate the reliability of series and parallel systems andthey can’t be used for complex systems. When the characterization of the system has alarge number of components the cost and computation time increase. Some of theseprocedures can’t be used for systems that component events have important statistical dependence. The matrix-based system reliability (MSR) method is capable of computingprobabilities of general system events efficiently using matrix processes. The method isuniformly appropriate to any type of system event including series, parallel, cut-set and link-set systems. Even when the system has statistical dependence components, thematrix-based method enables us to estimate the failure probability of structure. This paper described the MSR method and its use for calculating the reliability of an indeterminate truss structure. Finally the results are compared with MCS.

Keywords:

System reliability , Monte Carlo Simulation , Matrix-based system reliability method , Complex system , Indeterminate truss structure