Investigation of the occurrence of: no-faults-found in electronic equipment

Author

Jones, Jeff ; Hayes, Joe

Author_Institution

Sch. of Eng., Univ. of Warwick, Coventry, UK

Volume

50

Issue

3

fYear

2001

fDate

9/1/2001 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

289

Lastpage

292

Abstract

This paper investigates the occurrence of the NFF (no fault found) failure in electronic equipment. The main types of NFF are outlined, and then the results of accessing the Loughborough University reliability database to investigate the root causes of NFF is discussed. The presence of complex components and connectors and the effect of equipment complexity and fraction-usage are examined as causes of NFF. The presence of connectors or complex components on a board and the fraction usage, and the complexity of equipment have little or no effect on the number of NFF events. No relationship was found between equipment usage or equipment complexity and NFF occurrence. The reason for such a high incidence of NFF in electronic equipment has not yet been identified, and further work into this phenomenon is required. Of course factors such as software faults and transient effects, amongst other causes, are likely to be involved

Keywords

circuit reliability; electrical faults; electronic equipment testing; failure analysis; Loughborough University reliability database; circuit reliability; complex components; complex connectors; electronic equipment; equipment complexity; equipment usage; field-failure database; fraction-usage; no-faults-found failure occurrence; software faults; transient effects; Boolean functions; Circuit faults; Circuit testing; Connectors; Data structures; Databases; Electronic equipment; Failure analysis; Integrated circuit reliability; Military computing;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Reliability, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9529

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/24.974126

Filename

974126