Electrical Engineering Stack Exchange
Electrical Engineering Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [reliability]

169 questions
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What happened to electrolytic capacitors in the 21st century?

We can sometimes see decades-old capacitors (such as ones made in the USSR) still working. They are bigger and heavier, but durable and not desiccating. Modern aluminium capacitors serve for about 11 years, if you are lucky, then become dry and…
Incnis Mrsi
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Why is the temperature range of industrial and military products so high?

From Wikipedia the common temperature range for electrical components is: Commercial: 0 to 70 °C Industrial: -40 to 85 °C Military: -55 to 125 °C I can understand the lower part (-40°C and -55°C) as these temperatures do exist in cold countries like…
ElectronS
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Is an Arduino Uno capable of running 24/7?

I'm curious as to the reliability and durability of the Arduino Uno. Does anybody have experience in "killing" one due to excessive use? If so, how long did it take for the board to fail?
nathangiesbrecht
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Design for long term reliability?

I need to design a small board that will go into a large piece of public infrastructure intended to last many decades. I am looking for papers and the like that give guidance on such design based on real research. This board will be much bigger for…
Olin Lathrop
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Reliability of the Arduino platform for industrial use

I'm no electrical engineer (just mechanical) but I would like to apply some of my hobbyist experience to my job and implement various automated systems in an industrial (manufacturing) environment. Traditionally, automation in the industrial…
Faken
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6 answers

How precise is the frequency of the AC electricity network?

If I make a digital clock which first detects the AC frequency roughly (whether it is 50, 60, 100Hz, etc), then uses it as its clock pulse source, how precise would it be? Would it work world wide precisely? For instance, in USA, what is the mean…
hkBattousai
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How to design electronics to last 40 years or more?

I've been reading about the Voyager space probes and am very curious about how you design electronics and instrumentation for a very long life (40+ years) without any physical maintenance. My guesses so far include: Physical protection for…
ConanTheGerbil
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Why exactly do chips start malfunctioning once they overheat?

Once a chip overheats it can start malfunctioning - for example many programs may start failing once some or all parts in a computer overheat. What exactly happens that makes chips malfunction when they overheat?
sharptooth
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Reliability problems with an array of 91 high-power LEDs

I have designed and printed a 4-layer PCB that accommodates 91 infrared LEDs in a 7x13 rectangular layout. This will be used as a backlight for a machine vision project. I am having a problem where individual LEDs are burning out or perhaps becoming…
cxrodgers
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How can we test the lifespan of electrical components?

We work with some electronic devices in our projects. We are at the stage where we need to create some test strategy to validate the lifespan (e.g. 1 to 5 years) of our devices for which we provide warranty. We need to standardize this test strategy…
MKSJ
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Is "automotive" grade always better?

I'm working on the parts list for a number of designs for low-voltage (24 VDC) industrial circuits that have no special safety requirements: so long as they don't catch fire no one could be hurt nor property damaged. But they will be used in…
jonathanjo
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Why is a MEMS device affected by helium but not hydrogen?

It seems that MEMS is very sensitive to helium, but only helium. This Link stated that hydrogen does not affect MEMS, which surprised me. Does anybody know why it's just helium, or what's really going on? According to the link, an iPhone 8 will stop…
MicroservicesOnDDD
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What is the lowest capacitor voltage rating that is safe to use?

I'm using a few Case R tantalum capacitors (10uF 6.3V) as bulk decoupling on the 3.3V power of a 100mbps Ethernet phy. I am also using 0.1uF ceramics closer to the pins. As usual, I'm terribly pushed for space on the PCB, and so I would like to…
Rocketmagnet
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I2C minimum clock speed and reliability

Is there a minimum clock rate specified by I2C? I know the most widely used clock rate is 100kHz and there is a "fast" mode of 400kHz supported by some devices, and a faster yet mode supported by other devices (I think 1MHz?). Since the SCK signal…
vicatcu
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Why are BJTs more reliable than MOSFETs under severe weather conditions?

I read in a textbook (Microelectronic Circuits by Sedra and Smith, pg. 494, (2010) sixth edition) that BJTs are preferred by the automotive industry due to their reliability under severe weather conditions. I understand that temperature affects the…
David
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