On Stress-Strength Reliability with a Time-Dependent Strength

Abstract

The study of stress-strength reliability in a time-dependent context needs to model at least one of the stress or strength quantities as dynamic. We study the stress-strength reliability for the case in which the strength of the system is decreasing in time and the stress remains fixed over time; that is, the strength of the system is modeled as a stochastic process and the stress is considered to be a usual random variable. We present stochastic ordering results among the lifetimes of the systems which have the same strength but are subjected to different stresses. Multicomponent form of the aforementioned stress-strength interference is also considered. We illustrate the results for the special case when the strength is modeled by a Weibull process.