Failure mode and effects analysis: a decision-making risk prioritisation approach

Failure mode and effect analysis (FMEA) is a method of risk assessment that is broadly utilised to identify, predict as well as mitigate possible defects in products, operations, and systems prior to the occurrence of a negative incident. However, inaccurate results may be generated due to the uncertain conditions under which risk assessment using the FMEA. Therefore, there is need to mitigate the uncertainty, particularly randomness and fuzziness in the assessment process. This can be achieved by using grey numbers to develop the FMEA and VIKOR methods to fix several hindrances related to the risk priority number (RPN) of the traditional FMEA. This paper aims to compare the Grey VIKOR with the traditional FMEA to present more accurate ranking. In the first step, grey system was used to rank failure modes and select risk elements to join vulnerability into subjective judgments. Thereafter, VIKOR method was applied for prioritising and evaluating failure modes. The results of comparative analysis indicate the adequacy and versatility of the proposed method in dealing with real-world issues.