Introduction to Functional Safety – Free Application Note
Here’s a very nice explanatory guide to IEC61508 which again, goes back a while, but has some good material in it. MTL’s An introduction to Functional Safety and IEC 61508 points out that the benefits to users are that a more scientific, numeric approach to specifying and designing safety systems is possible; the nature of the risk can be quantified; and a protective system appropriate to the risk can be designed. It means that under- or over-specifying of protective systems is less likely and, in many cases, a less expensive solution can be shown to provide adequate protection.
The Application Note is intended to provide a brief introduction to the IEC61508 standard and to illustrate how it is applied, although it does not claim to be a complete interpretation of the standard – not in just 16 pages!
