Technical Paper
Synthesis of Accelerated and More Realistic Vibration Endurance Tests Using Kurtosis
2016-04-05
2016-01-0275
Ground vehicle components are designed to withstand the real operational conditions they will experience during their service life. Vibration tests are performed to qualify their endurance. In order to replicate the same failure mechanism as in real conditions, the test specification must be representative of the service loads. The accelerated testing method, based on fatigue damage spectra (FDS), is a process for deriving a synthesized power spectral density (PSD) representing a random stationary Gaussian excitation and applied over a reduced duration. In real life, however, it is common that service loading includes non-Gaussian excitations. The consequences of not using a representative test signal during product validation testing are a higher field failure rate and added warranty costs. The objective of this paper is to describe a method for synthesizing a PSD test specification with a given kurtosis value, which represents a nonstationary non-Gaussian signal.