INSTRUCTOR’S GUIDE
TO PROBLEM SOLUTIONS
For
SYSTEMS ENGINEERING
AND ANALYSIS
Fifth Edition
By
Benjamin S. Blanchard
Wolter J. Fabrycky
FOREWORD
There are exactly 500 end-of–chapter questions, problems, and exercises for
student response and solution in this textbook. These are included to
emphasize the application of systems engineering concepts, principles, and
methods and to provide practice in systems analysis.
The responses presented are suggestive rather than complete. There may be
subjectivity inherent in some of the solution procedures. In these cases,
problems may be interpreted differently but correctly by different people.
Other problems may be solved in different ways, with the numerical result
being essentially the same for all correct procedures. Further, many of the
approaches and solutions are based on the personal experience of the authors
which is likely to be different for other individuals. While the solutions
given have been found to be simple and easily understood by most people, it
is assumed that the instructor will view differences accordingly and enlarge
upon them based on his or her own experience.
We would greatly appreciate any feedback and advice that you may wish to
offer about the questions, problems, and exercises and their solutions. The
validity and completeness of these exercises relative to the textbook material
is of keen interest to us. We seek to continuously improve both the presented
material in the book as well as the questions and problems derived there
from. In this regard we wish to thank Alan L. Fabrycky for his dedicated
editorial assistance in the preparation of this Instructor’s Guide.
This is a good opportunity for us to thank you for choosing Systems
Engineering and Analysis, the Thirtieth Anniversary Edition, for use in your
course. We wish you the very best in your teaching and in promoting the
benefits of this emerging engineering interdiscipline.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Part I Introduction to Systems
Chapter 1 Systems Science and Engineering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Chapter 2 Bringing Systems Into Being . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Part II The System Design Process
Chapter 3 Conceptual System Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Chapter 4 Preliminary System Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Chapter 5 Detail Design and Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Chapter 6 System Test, Evaluation, and Validation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Part III Systems Analysis and Design Evaluation
Chapter 7 Alternatives and Models in Decision Making . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Chapter 8 Models for Economic Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Chapter 9 Optimization in Design and Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Chapter 10 Queuing Theory and Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Chapter 11 Control Concepts and Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Part IV Design for Operational Feasibility
Chapter 12 Design for Reliability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Chapter 13 Design for Maintainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Chapter 14 Design for Usability (Human Factors) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
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Chapter 15 Design for Logistics and Supportability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Chapter 16 Design for Producibility, Disposability, and Sustainability . 115
Chapter 17 Design for Affordability (Life-Cycle Costing) . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Part V Systems Engineering Management
Chapter 18 Systems Engineering Planning and Organization . . . . . . . . . 140
Chapter 19 Program Management, Control, and Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . 151
7) A static system such as a highway system may be contrasted with an airline system, which
is a dynamic system. In the former, structure exists without activity whereas in the latter,
8) A cannon is an example of a closed system. When a cannon is fired, a one–to–one
correspondence exists between the initial and final states. However, the defense
9) A watershed is a natural system made up of objects or components such as land,
vegetation, and the watercourse; attributes such as the soil type, timber species, and the
river width; and relationships such as the distribution of the attributes over the terrain. A
10) The purposes of a chemical processing plant in a market economy are to produce one or
more chemical products and possibly byproducts that can be sold at a profit while fulfilling
11) During startup the state of a chemical processing plant is that pipes and vessels are filled to
a certain location and empty after that location; pumps for vessels being filled are running
12) A pump and the tank it fills have a relationship. The pump provides the material that the
tank needs, while the tank provides a location where the pump can store the material it
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13) In a computer system, the power supply and system board have a first-order relationship
because the system board must receive the reduced voltage produced by the power supply
in order to function, and the power supply would be useless if there were no system board
1.1.1 (page 4).
14) Human introduction of plant or animal species into regions where they do not naturally
15) The movement of individual molecules is a random dynamic system property whose
18) Analyzing a company’s information systems as a system-of-systems can reveal the need for
19) Cybernetics may be described and explained by considering the early mechanical version
of a governor to control the revolutions per minute (RPM) of an engine. Centrifugal force,
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20) Student exercise. Refer to Section 1.3.2 (page 10) for Boulding‘s hierarchy. Describe the
22) Health care is a societal need. Requirements of a health care system include diagnostic
services, curative services, and services to help individuals maintain and improve their
23) Both systemology and synthesis produce systems. Systemology produces a system of
24) The phrase “technical system” is used to represent all types of human–made artifacts,
including engineered products and processes. Classifying a technical system is generally
25) Factors driving technological change include attempts to respond to unmet current needs
26) Human society is characterized by its culture. Each human culture manifests itself through
27) Attributes of the Machine Age are determinism, reductionism, physical, cause and effect,
28) Analytic thinking seeks to explain the whole based on explanations of its parts. Synthetic
29) The special engineering requirements of the Systems Age are those which pertain to
30) Both systems engineering and the traditional engineering disciplines deal with technology
and technical (human-made) entities. The focus of traditional engineering is on technical
design of the entities in human-made systems, whereas systems engineering concentrates
on what the entities are intended to do (functional design) before determining what the
entities are. Traditional engineering focuses on technical performance measures, whereas
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33) Systems engineering is an interdiscipline (sometimes called a multidiscipline or
34) Refer to Section 1.6 (pages 17-19) for several definitions and then offer one that you prefer.
36) Student exercise requiring use of the INCOSE web site, www.incose.org. Reference:
Section 1.7 (page 20).