Reliability and life testing have the following objectives:
Determine if the performance of components, equipment, and systems, either under closely controlled and known stress conditions in a testing laboratory or under field use conditions, with or without corrective and preventive maintenance, and with known operating procedures, is within specifications for the desired function period, and if it is not, whether it is the result of a malfunction or of a failure which requires corrective action.
Determine the pattern of recurring failures, the causes of failure, the underlying times-to-failure distribution, and the associated stress levels.
Determine the failure rate, the mean life, and the reliability of components, equipment, and systems and their associated confidence limits at desired confidence levels.
Based on the results obtained, provide guidelines as to whether corrective actions should be taken and what these should be.
Provide reevaluation of the reliabilitywise performance of the units after corrective actions are taken to assure that these actions were the correct ones and as effective as intended.
Determine the growth in the mean life and/or the reliability of units during their research, engineering and development phase; and whether the growth rate is sufficient enough to meet the mean life and/or the reliability requirements of the specifications by the time the life and/or the reliability need to be demonstrated.
Provide a means to statistically and scientifically determine, with chosen risks, whether a redesign has indeed improved the failure rate, mean life, or reliability of components...
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