Abstract

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and Deutsches Zentrum Für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) e. V. are working together to create a Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA). One of the key elements of the modification of the Boeing 747-SP aircraft to be used is a new door system that both protects the infrared telescope during flight by covering the aircraft cavity within which the telescope resides and following the telescopes motion to provided an unvignetted view of the sky. The intentions of this paper are: describe the value added by a productive interaction of reliability engineering with the integrated product design team at NASA Ames Research Center which is responsible for design of this “cavity door” system; to point out key reliability improvement strategies applied to the cavity door system; and to offer a few principles to guide interaction of reliability engineers with a design team.

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