How does an FMEA work?
Basically, an FMEA is a listing of all potential failures and their corresponding effects of the product or process under investigation. It is not unusual for an FMEA to list 50 to 200 different potential failures. If an FMEA has over 200 potential failures it is a good sign that the product or process under investigation should be broken into subunits, each with its own FMEA. For example, automotive companies don’t conduct FMEAs on the entire car, but rather individual components of the car. Each potential failure mode will have at least one, if not several potential effects or consequences of the failure, potential causes of the failure, and current controls to prevent the failure from occurring or to detect the failure once it does occur. The potential effects of the failure are rated on a scale of 1 to 10 where 10 is the most severe consequence. The potential causes of the failure are rated in terms of the chance of the cause occurring, also on a scale of 1 to 10 where 10 is the gr
