A HALT Plan Question
Abstract
Kirk and Fred discuss a test plan sent to Kirk and how this plan misses the point of accelerated testing.
Key Points
Join Kirk and Fred as they discuss the fact that many of are labeled by the book titles they have written and yet we know many other important analysis techniques that we know and use.
Topics include:
- HALT evaluations require a lot of thinking about what needs to be tested, what stresses to apply to what parts of the systems, and what will be defined as a failure
- In a nutshell, HALT is a methodology of applying environmental stress in a step-wise controlled function to electronic and electro-mechanical systems while operating, The stresses are applied to the point failure, then analysis of the potential weakness, then improving the weakness and repeating to the point that the design has reached the fundamental limit of standard technologies.
- Kirk recalls discussing a component change with a manager who argued that a component failure that happened at a wide range of temperatures would never occur in the field, but with the change and a HASS process on the product reduced the warranty return rate from 5% to 0.5% return rate.
- The most important step in the HALT process is when a weak link is found that is well below the fundamental limit of technology is to improve it. HALT is a waste of time for those companies who want to reduce failures as opposed to telling customers that they do HALT, for marketing purposes.
- HASS is unnecessary if every unit is manufactured with little or no variations, but that is rare for most industries. Latent defects can be introduced into the supply chain at anytime in the manufacturing life cycle.
Enjoy an episode of Speaking of Reliability. Where you can join friends as they discuss reliability topics. Join us as we discuss topics ranging from design for reliability techniques to field data analysis approaches.
Show Notes
You can now purchase the most recent recording of Kirk Gray’s Hobbs Engineering 8 (two 4 hour sessions) hour Webinar “Rapid and Robust Reliability Development – 2022 HALT & HASS Methodologies Online Seminar” from this link.
Please click on this link to access a relatively new analysis of traditional reliability prediction methods article from the US ARMY and CALCE titled “Reliability Prediction – Continued Reliance on a Misleading Approach”
For more information on the newest discovery testing methodology here is a link to the book “Next Generation HALT and HASS: Robust design of Electronics and Systems” written by Kirk Gray and John Paschkewitz.
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