Simplified Highly-Accelerated Life Testing on components for product-level vibration reliability enhancement

The current trend towards the placement of electronics hardware in harsh vibration environments with the simultaneous need to control costs by using 'off-the-shelf' electronics components has introduced additional challenges. The need therefore exists for a means to rapidly and cost-effectively test the vibration robustness of individual components and assemblies. To address this particular need, specialized hardware has been developed along with the associated methodology. The hardware developed essentially consists of a simple mechanical vibration amplifier controlled using a closed-loop feedback system, by means of which extreme vibration levels (in excess of 250 Gs) can be achieved using a low power vibration shaker system. The methodology of testing consists of a simplified form of the Highly-Accelerated Life Testing (HALT) methodology and involves subjecting components under consideration to high levels of vibration and testing to the point of failure. Based on test results, a relative assessment can be rapidly made for various changes in product configuration. This is best illustrated by an example where several configuration variations were tested using this methodology to solve a capacitor failure problem. The techniques described here can potentially be applied to a wide range of electronics components. As can be inferred from the example in the paper, these techniques offer the potential for considerable cost-savings in the form of minimizing product-level testing, along with improvement in the reliability of the end product.