Why Test Your Products?

Engineers face many challenges when testing during environmental stress testing. The type of environmental testing impacts the "test and measurement" techniques and will determine how useful the environmental testing is. In this paper we will cover the fundamental aspects of why you need to functionally test your products during stress testing, the proper test coverage required, the proper setup for testing, and relevant data collection of results

Many different stresses can be applied to products. Environmental stresses used can include ambient or high temperature burn-in, temperature cycling, combined temperature and humidity, temperature with humidity and pressure, thermal shock, vibration, or other stress combinations. Or a screening process can be used such as Environmental Stress Screening (ESS), Highly Accelerated Life Testing (HALT), Highly Accelerated Stress Screening (HASS), or other processes. Each of these techniques will require capital equipment, such as an environmental chamber. By using the proper test strategy, you will get more out of your screening program through better utilization of your equipment as well as the human resources and associated overhead.