The Development of Vibration Environments for Accelerated Testing of Automotive Components

The critical structural criterion for many automotive components is their capability to survive the applied vibration environments. To this end, laboratory testing can assist in the design and development of new components. Of particular advantage is the capability to accelerate the laboratory testing to evaluate component configurations more quickly than by duplicating real-world conditions. Accelerated testing can save both time and money in component development while maintaining the frequency content and applied energy levels of the real-world environments.

This paper presents information on the acquisition of data, data reduction, the development of laboratory vibration environments, and details for testing. Evaluations are made of sinusoidal, real time simulation, and random vibration test methods. The requirements necessary for developing an accelerated laboratory test environment are presented.