Abstract To represent and reason uncertain knowledge in the complex system dynamically and effectively, a self-adaptive method based on fuzzy-Petri net (FPN) and genetic particle swarm optimization (GPSO) algorithm is proposed. In this method, the knowledge-representation model based on FPN is established to build the mathematical model. And the GPSO is used in self-learning of the uncertain parameters to achieve self-adaptation of the model. Finally, a servo mechanism fault diagnose of launch vehicle is used to verify the proposed method.