BTH 780

Reliability Engineering
Topic: Reliability Testing
Lecture Slide #7
Lecturer: Prof. VSS Yadavalli
Dr. MK Ayomoh
Reliability Testing
Reliability Testing
Test with censoring/without censoring
Test with/without replacement
Burn-in tests
Life Tests
o Exact field
o Simulated
o Accelerated
 Compressed Time Test
Reliability Testing
o Accelerated Life Test Contd…….
 Advanced Stress Test in relation to increased:
• temperature
• pressure
• voltage
• mechanical stress etc
Reliability Testing
Life Test with censoring
o Time-censored test
o Failure-failure censored test
Reliability Testing
Life Test without censoring
 In this testing approach, the experimentation is allowed to continue until
all the samples have failed.
Reliability Testing
Life Test with replacement
 Important when there is a need to test a large experimental sample size
however with a limited testing chamber.
Reliability Testing
Life Test without replacement
 This is often the default testing plan. As the tested items fail, they are
either taken off the test chamber or just noted without necessarily
tampering with the preset conditions of the chamber.
Reliability Testing
Burn-in Tests
 Test carried out to deal with unreliability experienced at the
infant phase of the bathtub curve i.e. failures due to poor
design, material quality, manufacturing issues etc.
Reliability Testing
Exact Field Tests
 Here, items are tested while in actual field operation. Testing is
of a secondary importance here while operation is the primary
focus.
Reliability Testing
Simulated Life Tests
 Here items are tested in simulated operating conditions. Equipment such
as test chambers is used for generating/obtaining these simulated
operating conditions. Theoretically, the test conditions may be closer to
the exact operational conditions however, not without some form of error.

 Simulated life test is also referred to as environmental test i.e. simulated

nature and induced environmental test. This often includes simulation of
temperature, pressure, shock and vibration, humidity, electromagnetic
compatibility etc.
Reliability Testing
Accelerated Life Testing (ALT)
 At times, the need to accelerate failure tests of systems is important to
system developers wanting to meet up with certain due dates. Based on
this, the ALT has continued to gain tremendous attention in the design
world.
ALT can be classified into two categories viz:
o Compressed time test
o Advanced stress test
Reliability Testing
Compressed time tests
 In compressed time testing, a product is used more frequently in the life
test than it would be in normal use, however, the loads and environmental
stresses on the product are maintained at the same level as in the normal
use.

Advanced (high) stress tests:

 When life tests are conducted at higher stress levels or harsher
environments to generate more data in a short time, failure rate will
increase by default. This is often referred to as advanced (high) stress
tests.
Accelerated Life Testing

Effect of Accelerated Test on the Bathtub Curve

Accelerated Life Testing

Failure Rate, MTTF and Stress Level

Example
At full rated voltage, failure rate is given as 0.001 per million hours (Mh). It is
required of you to evaluate the failure rate of a device if it is operated at 20%
of its rate voltage.
Derating
The previous example speaks to a sub-topic with the nomenclature derating.
Derating is a term used to describe the act of reducing electrical and/or
thermal stresses applied to a system or its members to sustain the system
and enhance its reliability.

This often goes with the term “factor of safety” measured as:

Derating can be carried out on voltage, current, power, force, torque, speed,
temperature, humidity etc.
Example
The component list, quantity and failure rates, and activation energies are
shown in following Table. It is required to evaluate the test duration at a test
temperature of 100 degrees Celsius for two cases: (a) demonstration of
mission time of 5 years and (b) test for life estimation. The normal operating
temperature of the sub-assembly is 25 degree Celsius.
Example Contd…
Example
Case (a) 5 years mission life demonstration
Using the model of Average acceleration factor for sub-assemblies result in:
Example
Case (a) 5 years mission life demonstration
Using the model of maximum acceleration factor for the sub-assemblies
results in:
Example
Case (b): Test for life estimation
Using the model of maximum acceleration factor for the sub-assemblies
results in:
Highly Accelerated Life Testing (HALT)
Highly accelerated life testing or highly accelerated stress screening is a
non-quantitative life testing approach. It is often referred to as foolish failure.
In the traditional ALT, the level of stress application is restricted such that it
does not result in the change of failure mode of the item under test
compared to the failure modes it normally experience in the field.

HALT is non-restrictive in its stress application level to an item under test.

Based on this, new failure modes or changes in the normal failure modes is
often experienced.