2021 Global Reliability and Prognostics and Health Management (PHM-Nanjing)
Reliability Test of Aircraft Integrated Electronic
Assemblies Based on Virtual Qualification Method
2021 Global Reliability and Prognostics and Health Management (PHM-Nanjing) | 978-1-6654-0131-9/21/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/PHM-Nanjing52125.2021.9613086
Xingliu Zhang Zhifeng Xie
Institute of Reliability Institute of General
Engineering Technology
Beihang University Chinese Flight Test
Beijing, China Establishment
zhangxingliu@buaa.edu.cn Xi’an, China
zhifeng423@126.com
Abstract—With the rapid development of aeronautic technology,
modular electronic assemblies have begun to be applied widely in
aeronautic products. However, inadequately validated assemblies
could introduce failure risks to the flight missions. Therefore, the
reliability test of the electronic assemblies is significant to verify
the prototypes and identify the defects for each mission. In order
to optimize the test costs and determine the suitable test duration,
a virtual qualification method for the reliability test was
proposed. In this paper, the mission profile was analyzed firstly
in detail during the service life of the aircraft, such as vibration,
thermal cycling, power consumptions, etc. The design
characteristics of the electronic assemblies for aircraft were
introduced. Further, the methodology based on the finite element
analysis and virtual qualification method was proposed to
calculate the acceleration factors of the mission profile and
potential test profiles. By using the digital prototype, a virtual
qualification was performed to test and evaluate the assemblies.
Finally, a case was completed to guide engineering applications
by using real aircraft electronic assemblies.
Keywords- Reliability Test; Virtual Qualification; Aircraft
Integrated Electronic Assemblies; Lifetime Evaluation
I. INTRODUCTION
Traditional aircraft sub-systems were mostly divided into
several parts according to their functions, and each sub-system
was designed independently. This design idea led to low
functional density and low versatility of the system. Therefore,
the use of aircraft integrated design ideas was born, which used
standard interfaces and protocol specifications to interconnect
aircraft electronic assemblies [1]. This design had the
advantages of internal information sharing, functional
integration, and modularity.
However, a series of reliability characteristics of the
electronic assemblies should be tested and verified. Therefore,
more reliability tests must be taken to improve the maturity and
reliability of integrated electronic systems to ensure the
integrated electronic system operates stably and reliably in
actual flight.
978-1-6654-0131-9/21/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE
Authorized licensed use limited to: Universite du Quebec en Outaouais. Downloaded on May 22,2024 at 13:22:10 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
Zili Wang Chen Lu
Institute of Reliability Institute of Reliability
Engineering Engineering
Beihang University Beihang University
Beijing, China Beijing, China
wzl@buaa.edu.cn luchen@buaa.edu.cn
In previous research, most methods clarified the
characteristics of assemblies based on reliability tests, and the
test stress of the reliability test was applied separately [2]. Real
test methods are costly and run over a considerable period.
Moreover, there was a certain difference from the real mission
profile of the assemblies as the test stress was applied
separately. Therefore, this paper proposed a virtual reliability
qualification test method to solve this problem.
In this paper, the mission profile during the service life of
the aircraft was analyzed firstly in detail, and the stress values
of vibration and thermal cycling were mainly evaluated. The
characteristics of the immature electronic assemblies were
analyzed afterward. A digital prototype was established after
the virtual qualification test conditions were determined. At the
same time, to figure out the thermal and mechanical properties
of the assemblies quickly, accelerated stress was applied to the
digital prototype, and the test stress was correlated with the
failure acceleration factor to estimate the life of the assemblies.
Finally, the life assessment of the aircraft electronic assemblies
was based on the results of accelerated test stress.
In this paper, the case verification was completed by using
actual aircraft electronic assemblies to guide engineering
applications.
Consequently, the main highlights and contributions of this
paper can be summarized as follows:
1. A universal virtual qualification reliability test method
suitable was proposed for aircraft integrated electronic
assemblies;
2. A lifetime evaluation method based on virtual
qualification test results was proposed.
2021 Global Reliability and Prognostics and Health Management
(PHM-Nanjing)
 II. PRELIMINARIES
A. Mission Profile of Aircraft Integrated Electronic
Assemblies
The main goal of analyzing the mission profile is mainly to
determine the stress type to be selected for the virtual
qualification test.
Aircraft electronic assemblies can be affected by many
environmental stresses, and previous studies have shown that
vibration stress and thermal stress have the greatest impact on
assemblies’ life. During the launch and landing of an aircraft,
large changes in acceleration are generated that bringing about
huge impact stress, noise, and vibration stress [4]. In the
process of flight, facing weather environment factors such as
airflow bumps, which will produce vibration, and vibration
stress has a significant impact on the loss of onboard equipment
parts. Besides, in the process of flight altitude varies, the
temperature will change accordingly. The temperature
difference can even reach 150ć, which has a negative impact
on the aging failure of important components [1].
Therefore, when choosing the standard stress of the mission
profile, vibration stress and thermal stress can be selected to
simplify the test profile of the virtual qualification test so that
the design of the mission profile can have a better reference.
B. Design Characteristics of Aircraft Integrated Electronic
Assemblies
In order to solve the problems of low functional density and
high resource consumption of traditional aeronautic stand-alone
assemblies, the new generation of aircraft integrated electronic
assemblies were designed, which adopt standardized and
modular design ideas, making integrated electronic assemblies
have good versatility and scalability. However, this design
made integrated electronic assemblies became the center of the
task, so they must have high functional density and reliability
during the operation of the aircraft. Therefore, in order to
ensure the reliability of the assemblies, it was necessary to
carry out a series of reliability tests.
Figure 1. An engineering prototype of one series of aircraft electronic
assembly
Authorized licensed use limited to: Universite du Quebec en Outaouais. Downloaded on May 22,2024 at 13:22:10 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
Fig. 1 showed an integrated electronic assembly for aircraft
under development, which now is the mainstream direction of
the design of electronic assemblies.
III. METHODOLOGY
A. Test Profile Based on Mission Profile
When designing the test profile, two factors need to be
considered:
a) Corresponding test stress conditions should be designed
on the basis of the real mission profile experienced by the
aircraft so as to serve as the basis for calculation.
b) In order to guide the efficiency and economy of the
reliability life test, meanwhile, to effectively expose the failure
of the assemblies, it is necessary to design the test profile under
high-stress conditions.
B. Finite Element Modeling and Stress Response Analysis
A finite element model based on the target assemblies is the
basis of the virtual qualification test [3]. Thus, virtual
verification of vibration damage and virtual verification of
thermal cycle damage can be carried out under the reasonable
stress
Fig. 2 showed the schematic diagram of the engineering
prototype of an aircraft electronic assembly.
Figure 2. Schematic diagram of module-level and device-level
assemblies
C. Stress Design of Virtual Qualification Test
The acceleration model is used to describe the relationship
between the reliability of assemblies under two different
conditions, the standard test condition and the acceleration test
condition [5]. Carrying out the accelerated test can greatly
reduce the test cost and expose assemblies’ failures more
effectively, as is mentioned above.
Moreover, a reasonable acceleration model can predict the
life of the assemblies under the specified conditions much
better.
D. Virtual Qualification Test Result Evaluation
Based on failure cumulative damage theory [6], the
decrease in reliability is related to stress superposition, and the
reliability distribution function is
2021 Global Reliability and Prognostics and Health Management
(PHM-Nanjing)
 1 n
§ 1 ·
1 ¦¨ ¸, (1)
R i 1 © 1  Fi ¹

where R represent the state of the assemblies’ reliability

and Fi represent the damage caused by different stresses.
Using the reliability distribution function under the virtual
qualification test conditions, the acceleration factors of these
test profiles to the standard test profile can be presented.

IV. CASE STUDY

A. Test Profile Based on Mission Profile

The standard test conditions were based on the mission
profile that the aircraft may experience. As shown in Table 1, (a) Front view of module-level electronics
Table 2and Fig. 3, the vibration stress was only applied during
the first thermal stress cycle.
TABLE I STANDARD TEST CONDITIONS FOR THERMAL CYCLING
Upper temperature 55 ℃
Lower temperature -15 ℃
Temperature change rate 10 ℃/min
Upper-temperature duration 50 min
Lower-temperature duration 50 min

TABLE II STANDARD TEST CONDITIONS FOR VIBRATION STRESS

Frequency range (Hz) 20~100 100~600 600~2000
Acceleration power spectral +3 0.078 -9
density db/oct g2/Hz dB/oct
Total RMS acceleration 8g
Test duration (min / axis) 3
Test axis XǃYǃZ (b) Front view of the virtual identification model
Figure 4. Schematic diagram of module-level assemblies
Thermal /
Temperature Temperature
Vibration increase stage decrease stage

the remaining
The first cycle cycles
Figure 3. Test profile of reliability virtual qualification test

B. Finite Element Modeling and Stress Response Analysis

Temperature distribution on the front (55 ℃)
Fig. 4, Fig. 5, and Fig. 6 showed the schematic diagram of
module-level assemblies.

2021 Global Reliability and Prognostics and Health Management

(PHM-Nanjing)
Authorized licensed use limited to: Universite du Quebec en Outaouais. Downloaded on May 22,2024 at 13:22:10 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
 C. Stress Design of Virtual Qualification Test
TABLE III VIRTUAL QUALIFICATION TEST CONDITIONS FOR THERMAL
CYCLING STRESS澳
Upper temperature Lower temperature
T1 -15 ℃ 55 ℃
T2 -20 ℃ 60 ℃
T3 -25 ℃ 65 ℃
T4 -30 ℃ 70 ℃
T5 -35 ℃ 75 ℃

TABLE III showed the increasing thermal cycling stress for

Temperature distribution on the front (-15 ℃) virtual qualification. The temperature change rate, upper-
temperature duration, lower-temperature duration remained the
Figure 5. Thermal distribution of module-level assemblies same as the standard test conditions.
TABLE IV VIRTUAL QUALIFICATION TEST CONDITIONS FOR VIBRATION
STRESS
Acceleration power Total RMS
spectral density acceleration
V1 0.143 g2/Hz 8g
V2 0.179 g2/Hz 10 g
V3 0.214 g2/Hz 12 g
2
V4 0.250 g /Hz 14 g
V5 0.286 g2/Hz 16 g

TABLE IV showed the increasing vibration stress for

RMS stress response of X-axis (Pa) virtual qualification. Other conditions remained the same as the
standard test conditions.

D. Virtual Qualification Test Result Evaluation

RMS stress response of Y-axis (Pa)
The discrete data obtained by Monte Carlo sampling can be
used to obtain the reliability distribution function under
different test stresses.
The virtual qualification test results showed that when the
vibration stress and thermal stress were enhanced, the life of
the assemblies will be reduced according to certain cumulative
damage; the thermal cycle stress had a greater impact on the
life of the assemblies; at the same time, increasing the vibration
stress and thermal stress together can accelerate the life faster
the single stress.

RMS stress response of Z-axis (Pa)

Figure 6. Stress distribution of module-level assemblies

2021 Global Reliability and Prognostics and Health Management

(PHM-Nanjing)
Authorized licensed use limited to: Universite du Quebec en Outaouais. Downloaded on May 22,2024 at 13:22:10 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
 [2] NASA. Technical handbook, Aircraft dynamic environments
testing. NASA-HDBK-7008 (2014).
[3] Fu, Guicui, et al. "Life prediction methodology of system-in-
package based on physics of failure." Microelectronics Reliability
88 (2018): 173-178.
[4] Qin, Zhao-Ye, Shao-Ze Yan, and Fu-Lei Chu. "Dynamic
characteristics of launch vehicle and spacecraft connected by
clamp band." Journal of Sound and Vibration 330.10 (2011):
2161-2173.
[5] Pecht, Michael, ed. Product reliability, maintainability, and
supportability handbook. CRC Press, 2009.
[6] Wu, Fuqiang, and WeiXing Yao. "A fatigue damage model of
composite materials." International Journal of Fatigue 32.1
(2010): 134-138.

Figure 7. Life distribution under different stress conditions

The virtual qualification test results showed that when the

vibration stress and thermal stress were enhanced, the life of
the assemblies will be reduced according to certain cumulative
damage; the thermal cycle stress had a greater impact on the
life of the assemblies; at the same time, increasing the vibration
stress and thermal stress together can accelerate the life faster
the single stress.

CONCLUSION
The virtual qualification test results showed that by
increasing the test under severe comprehensive stress, the
assemblies will be greatly reduced according to the acceleration
factor, and the corresponding reliability test time will also be
greatly reduced. Therefore, when conditions permit, the
reliability virtual qualification test method is efficient and
economical. This test method can guide the design of the test
profile by giving the virtual qualification test profile and
acceleration factor.

REFERENCES
[1] Li, Wei-Jie, et al. "On-orbit service (OOS) of spacecraft: A review
of engineering developments." Progress in Aerospace Sciences
108 (2019): 32-120.

2021 Global Reliability and Prognostics and Health Management

(PHM-Nanjing)
Authorized licensed use limited to: Universite du Quebec en Outaouais. Downloaded on May 22,2024 at 13:22:10 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.