Aerospace & Defense Manufacturing worked example

Material Substitution Risk with technical impact severity of 5 1-10: a worked example

Here is what the math looks like when conditions slip. We hold every other input steady and drop technical impact severity to 5 1-10, then walk the calculation through step by step. Score aerospace material substitution risk using technical impact, substitution likelihood, and difficulty detecting compliance or performance issues.

The inputs for this scenario

  • Technical impact severity: 5 1-10 (the input this scenario stresses; the baseline uses 10)
  • Substitution pressure likelihood: 5 1-10 (held at the documented default)
  • Compliance or performance detection difficulty: 8 1-10 (held at the documented default)

Working through the calculation

  • The calculation starts from the formula this tool documents: Material substitution risk score = severity score × likelihood score × detection difficulty score.
  • Material substitution risk score works out to 5.75 score at these inputs, and this is the headline figure for the scenario.
  • Technical impact severity works out to 5 1-10 at these inputs.
  • Substitution pressure likelihood works out to 5 1-10 at these inputs.
  • Compliance or performance detection difficulty works out to 8 1-10 at these inputs.

How this compares with the baseline

  • Against the tool's baseline example, where technical impact severity sits at 10 1-10 and the headline result is 7.75 score, this scenario comes in 25.81% below the baseline at 5.75 score.
  • The practical read: the gap between this scenario and the baseline is entirely attributable to technical impact severity, so recovering it is worth quantifying in dollars before considering equipment or staffing changes. It ranks risk but does not replace engineering disposition; a low score never authorizes a substitution that violates the drawing or spec without proper sign-off.

Results at a glance

  • Material substitution risk score: 5.75 score (headline result)
  • Technical impact severity: 5 1-10
  • Substitution pressure likelihood: 5 1-10
  • Compliance or performance detection difficulty: 8 1-10

Run it with your numbers

  • To rerun this with your own numbers, open the live Material Substitution Risk calculator, set technical impact severity to your actual value, and adjust the remaining inputs to match your operation.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.