Determination of Sample Size in Service Inspection: S. Qin G. E. 0. Widera
Determination of Sample Size in Service Inspection: S. Qin G. E. 0. Widera
S. Qin
in Service Inspection
G. E. 0. Widera When performing inservice inspection on a large volume of identical components, it
Fellow ASME becomes an almost impossible task to inspect all those in which defects may exist,
even if their failure probabilities are known. As a result, an appropriate sample size
Department of Mechanical and needs to be determined when setting up an inspection program. In this paper, a
Industrial Engineering, probabilistic analysis method is employed to solve this problem. It is assumed that
Marquette University, the characteristic data of components has a certain distribution which can be taken
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as known when the mean and standard deviations of serviceable and defective sets
of components are estimated. The sample size can then be determined within an
acceptable assigned error range. In this way, both false rejection and acceptance
can be avoided with a high degree of confidence.
I Introduction nents are detected has been assigned, the minimum sample size
can be calculated.
The objective of inservice inspection (ISI) is to prevent unde-
sired failure of components or subsystems during their normal
operating life so as to avoid casualties, environmental damage, II Concept of the Theorem of Neyman and E.
and economic loss. After a risk assessment of components is Pearson
completed, an inspection program can be developed. There are Let £ be a random variable with a known distribution, and
three primary factors which must be taken into account; these
the parameters 6,, 62, . . . , 6„, upon which the distribution
are the time between inspection, the size of the sample con-
depends be unknown. Further, let x{, x2,.. ., xn be the observed
taining the degraded components (must be determined with a
values of £. Each set of xu x2, •. •, x„ belongs to one of two
sufficiently high level of confidence), and the probability that
categories, Rn i or R„2 . For example, if the value of p„ is assigned
the inspection method detects the degradation in the process
(ASME, 1991). When the number of components is large, an (0 < p0 < 1), let
appropriate sample size must be determined in view of the fact 1 "
that the cost for inspection of all components is, in general, a = - X xk (1)
unacceptably high. In the determination of the sample size, the n ,_,
variability in the environmental conditions and stress values When a < p , set {x } belongs to R \ otherwise set [x ]
a k nl k
should, of course, be considered first. However, when a large belongs to R .
n2
volume of components is subjected to nearly similar conditions, There are two alternative hypotheses: Hx and H2. We must
then obviously some method is needed to determine an econom- • make a choice between them, depending upon whether the ob-
ical sample size so as to decrease the inspection cost. To some servation values {x } belong to R or R . With reference to
k nl n2
extent, though, practical experiences may be available to help the foregoing example, Hi is the hypothesis that the expectation
engineers make that decision. of £ is less than p„, while H2 is that the expectation of £ is
There are two main factors which will affect the determina- greater thanp„, i.e.,
tion of the sample size. One is the probability that the sample
contains degraded components and the other is the cost of in- Ht: a < po;
spection. We intuitively know that the larger the sample size,
the larger the probability of the detection of degraded compo- H2: a > po (2)
nents as well as the higher the cost of inspection. So, the prob- When we make the choice of Hx or H2, two types of error
lem here is that given a sufficiently large probability for de- may occur. The first type of error is that Ht is rejected while it
tecting degradation in a process, how large of a sample size is actually is true. In other words, Hi is actually true, but [x ]
k
economical, or with a view to the cost of inspection and the falls in region R„ . The second type of error is that Hi is accept-
2
consequence of failure, what is the optimal sample size. able, but it is actually false. In this context, R„2 is referred to
In the following sections, a probabilistic analysis method is as the critical region. Let <x\ and a2 be the probabilities that an
presented to estimate the minimum sample size which has an error of Type I and of Type II occurs, respectively. For a given
acceptable probability of detection of degradation. The premise number of trials n, the choice of critical region can affect the
of the method is that the distribution function of the characteris- values of a^ and a , but it cannot make c^ and a arbitrarily
2 2
tic data is known. We depend on the characteristic data to small simultaneously. Thus, if n possesses a certain value, criti-
identify the serviceable and defective sets of components. Fortu- cal region R„ can only be chosen so as to make a take on a
2 2
nately, in practice, the characteristic data of components can be minimum value under the condition that a, attains a certain
considered to approximately have a normal distribution. When value. It can, thus, be shown that the following theorem of
both the mean and standard deviation are then estimated through
Neyman and Pearson holds (Gnedenko, 1992).
statistical approaches and the probability that degraded compo-
Theorem 1: Of all the possible critical regions for which the
probability of an error of Type I is a i, the probability of an
error of Type II assumes its least value for that critical region
Contributed by the Pressure Vessels and Piping Division and presented at the R%2 which consists of all points (xu x2, . . ., x„) for which
Pressure Vessels and Piping Conference, Minneapolis, Minnesota, June 19-23,
1994, of THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERS. Manuscript re-
ceived by the PVP Division, May 18, 1994; revised manuscript received March fl/U/tf,) a c Il/U/tf>) (3)
26, 1996. Associate Technical Editor: R. Streit.
a In c Vw
X (xk - Mi) (\i2 - /ii) = hi ( 6 ) [<K1 - «i) - <A(«2)]2 (H)
CTVn (u2 — nx (M2 ~ Mi) :
Nomenclature
ax = mean of characteristic data which ft = alternative hypothesis correspond- «i = probability that error of Type I
indicates components that can be ing to ft occurs
used continuously n = sample size a2 = probability that error of Type II
a2 = mean of characteristic data which n' = critical no. of defective compo- occurs
indicates components that must be nents for which all such compo- •y, ji = confidence levels
repaired or replaced nents should be replaced H = expectation of population
a' = critical value of characteristic data np = sample size of previous inspection a = variance of population
which indicates components that R„i = region corresponding to ft $( •) = standard normal distribution
fail Rn2 = region corresponding to ft function
ft = null hypothesis .? = standard deviation of characteristic !/>(•) = reverse function of $( •)
data
I "
(14)
ax — b < Mi < fl| + b
Because 2 (xk - a„) = 0, 2 (xk - a0)2 may be expressed as a To avoid n being infinite and to guarantee that ( a ' - /J-I) ' s
sum of the square of (n - 1) stochastically independent nor- positive, according to the'assumption that a' > Mi» fli m u s t be
mally distributed variables (Hald, 1952). According to the less than ( a ' — b). The minimum value of ( a ' — ^ ) would