Best practices for development and deployment of man-portable ATE

Man-portable test systems are under severe size, weight, environmental and power consumption constraints. Yet, these systems generally must provide all test capabilities required by the supported units-under-test (UUT). The successful development of man-portable systems requires a paradigm shift in the test system architectural design. General purpose ATE architectures by and large still do not address the means to satisfy the UUT's expected operational environment during test. Instrument packaging has evolved from bench-top and rack-mount configurations to card/modular level products. However, most card/modular level instruments still need the support of card cages and backplanes for intercommunication, control, physical constraint, power and cooling and the legacy system architecture remains. It is a significant challenge to produce a rugged, man-portable automated test system by selecting only those hardware and software components available from standard commercial test equipment catalogs. Yet, the RFP requirements in conjunction with cost and schedule constraints mandate the building of a target system from as many existing commercial building blocks as possible. This paper presents a systems approach to the design, development and deployment of man-portable test systems that meet or exceed the user's real UUT test requirements. The paper discusses in detail the best practices SEI developed in order to optimize resulting performance, size, weight, environmental protection, power requirements and reusability of man-portable systems.