Accelerated Life Test Planning for Minimizing Misclassification Risks

The optimal plan of a time-censored accelerated life test (ALT) depends on unknown parameters in the ALT model. The general strategy for coping with this problem is to replace the unknown parameters with their a priori estimated values, after which we can design test plans that are robust to deviations of the estimated values. In an ALT with log-location-scale lifetime distribution and linear acceleration relation function, the slope parameter of the acceleration relation function usually has the highest uncertainty. Instead of prespecifying the slope parameter in the ALT design, in this article, we propose a new design criterion that minimizes the risk of misclassifying whether the product's pth quantile meets the design specification. Through a case study of a circular electric connector, we illustrate the proposed method, and compare it with other test criteria. The comparison result shows that the proposed plan exhibits good performance in both estimating and s-testing the product's pth quantile.