S.S. Rao presents the principles of reliability-based engineering and design in a simple and straight-forward approach. He addresses the design of mechanical components and systems; Monte Carlo simulation; reliability-based optimum design; strength-based reliability and interface theory; reliability testing; time-dependent reliability of components and systems; failure modes, event tree and fault tree analysis; quality control and reliability; modeling of geometry; weakest-link and fail-safe systems; maintainability and availability; extremal distributions; random variables and probability distributions; functions of random variables; and basic probability theory. With 254 illustrations and an index.