Accessible Engineering Innovation, home Talk to an engineer
ATE · EOL test · Jigs & fixtures · Sequencing

Automated Test & Measurement Systems

Automated test equipment development. End-of-line functional test systems, jigs and fixtures, and the sequencing and measurement software that turns a bench setup into a repeatable station.

Talk to an engineer Read our test systems notes
Audience

Who this is for

  • Tier suppliers

    A test station built for a part entering production, that covers the fixture, the interface, the sequencing and the result output.

  • Device manufacturers

    Prove every unit before it ships, at line rate, without a technician interpreting the result.

  • Engineering providers

    Add test-system capacity to a programme where the product team is already fully committed.

Scope

What we do

  1. 01

    End-of-line test systems

    End-of-line functional test system development, i.e. the station that decides whether a unit ships.

  2. 02

    Jigs and fixtures

    Test jig and fixture development, including the mechanical and electrical interface that has to survive thousands of insertions.

  3. 03

    DUT interface design

    Device under test interface design, where contact, protection and repeatability decide the validity of the measurement.

  4. 04

    Test sequencing software

    Test sequencing and measurement software that runs the plan, records the result, and brings the station to a defined, recorded state when something in the test setup fails.

  5. 05

    Measurement integration

    Instruments, power supplies and loads brought under one sequencer instead of separate scripts per bench.

  6. 06

    Traceability output

    Per-unit results emitted in a form the plant's systems can consume, instead of a machine log dump.

Capability

Technology verticals

Test methods
Functional test · end-of-line verification · communication interface test · parametric measurement · burn-in and soak sequencing
Interfaces
Instrument control · industrial fieldbus and Ethernet targets · database and MES result output
What you receive
Test station hardware and fixture where they are ours · DUT interface design · sequencing and measurement application + build environment · calibration and repeatability record · per-unit result output specification

What does automated test equipment development cover?

Automated test equipment development covers four parts: the fixture, the interface to the unit, the sequencer and the output.

Each is designed and verified separately because each can fail on its own. A fixture that holds the unit and makes contact. An interface that decides whether that contact yields a valid measurement. A sequencer that runs the plan and decides pass or fail. And the output, which determines whether the result is usable downstream. The engagement is usually one of these shapes:

  • A complete end-of-line station. End-of-line functional test system development for a part entering production, hardware and software.
  • The fixture on its own. Test jig and fixture development where the test plan exists and the mechanics do not.
  • The DUT interface. Device under test interface design, where contact, protection and repeatability are the engineering.
  • The software over your instruments. Test sequencing and measurement software, so a bench of scripts becomes one station with one result format.
  • An inherited station. Taking over something already in production and establishing what it measures today.

Contact repeatability is the most common source of trouble in production. A station that measures reliably on a bench and drifts on a line has usually not lost its instruments; the contact has changed, and the software has no way to detect it unless it was designed to.

A cross-section of an end-of-line station: a unit under test seated on alignment pegs in its fixture, clamp arms holding it down onto a row of spring contacts, instruments and supplies on the left cabled into the fixture and driven by the sequencing and measurement application above, and the per-unit pass or fail verdict leaving toward the plant's MES

An end-of-line station in cross-section: fixture, contact interface, sequencer and output.

How is fixture wear handled during design?

We treat contact quality as a measured quantity, so wear shows up as measurable drift before it causes false rejects.

A fixture makes contact thousands of times, and the resistance of that contact drifts well before it fails outright. A station with no allowance for this reports a gradual increase in marginal units, which then gets investigated as a manufacturing problem. The design answer is a known-good reference the station checks itself against, plus thresholds that separate a failing unit from a failing fixture, both specified as part of the test plan. The insertion count also sets the contact plating, hard gold over nickel for low-level signals, and whether contacts are field-replaceable.

Units per shift multiplied by product life giving the insertion count the fixture must survive, driving three decisions: contact plating, with hard gold over nickel for low-level signals and tin or palladium-nickel at higher signal levels; whether contacts can be swapped without rebuilding the fixture; and a known-good reference unit with thresholds that separate a failing unit from a failing fixture, plus a scheduled replacement interval

The insertion count the fixture has to survive, and the design decisions it drives.

How do you configure sequencing software to handle failures?

The sequencer is configured to define what happens outside the happy path, and hands back a consumable result.

  • Fault handling. Running a passing sequence is straightforward. A production station also has to handle a unit that does not respond, an instrument returning nonsense, a fixture that is half-closed, and an operator intervening mid-sequence. Each of those ends in a defined, recorded state rather than an exception.
  • The output. A per-unit result that reaches the plant’s systems in a form they already consume gets used, while an incompatible log file does not integrate well. This is usually done via live data collection similar to OPC UA or northbound integration.

A state machine for a production test sequence: running moves to a pass or fail verdict when the sequence completes, or to a faulted state, safe and recorded, on any of four events (a fixture half closed, no response from the unit, a nonsense reading, or an operator intervening); both produce a per-unit result in one format that goes to the plant's systems

Four ways a production sequence is interrupted, each ending in a defined, recorded state.

Which domains do you cover under test services, and how do they align?

Test systems borders embedded systems and protocol conformance work, and stops short of supervisory control.

Test targetWhere it is scopedWhy
The device or unit being testedembedded systemsIt is frequently a device of that kind, which is useful when deciding what to measure and where the failures are likely to be
The communication interfacereal-time Ethernet · fieldbusThe test plan draws on the conformance pre-testing we do there
Supervisory controlcontrol softwareIt is not part of automated test systems because the buyers share almost no vocabulary and no procurement path

We build and hand over the station and the interface along with the test system. Installation and commissioning on a production floor stays with the existing contractor team, and our engineers work alongside yours through integration and acceptance.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Who does automated test equipment development?
We do, for tier suppliers, device manufacturers and engineering providers, covering end-of-line functional test systems, the jigs and fixtures beneath them, and the sequencing and measurement software that makes a station repeatable. As an example, our team builds automotive test jigs for tier-1 engineering providers as an ongoing service.
What do you cover as part of the ongoing test-jig service?
New stations for new parts, changes to existing stations when a part or a test plan changes, fixture refurbishment as contact wear accumulates, and support on stations already running in production.
Do you provide automated test systems as part of DCS or SCADA control software?
No. Control software is the supervisory and control application for a machine. This is test and measurement, and the two are separated because the buyers share no vocabulary and no procurement path, even though the engineering underneath overlaps.
Do you calibrate or certify the test station?
We build the station, establish its repeatability and document it. Where a measurement has to be traceable to a standard, calibration is performed by an accredited body. We design for it, but do not certify it.
Can you take over an existing test system?
Usually. The first task is establishing what the current station measures today, which is a normal starting point on any inherited equipment.
Do you install the station on the production line?
We build it, integrate and test it with your engineers, and hand it over. Installation and commissioning on a production floor stays with the existing contractor team.
What does an end-of-line test station cost, and what is the lead time?
A fixture surviving thousands of insertions and a bench of scripts brought under one sequencer are different pieces of work, so a rate card would misprice both. We estimate each against the DUT, the volume and the test plan at the enquiry stage.
What framework do you use to run the sequencing software?
We do not resell sequencing software. We build into the framework your setup already uses, for example NI TestStand with LabVIEW or LabWindows/CVI, OpenHTF, a pytest-based Python harness, or Vector CANoe and vTESTstudio where the test is of an automotive bus, with instrument control over SCPI and VISA. Which one it is follows from your instruments and your volumes. The discipline that matters is the failure handling, covering a fixture half-closed, an instrument returning nonsense and an operator intervening mid-sequence, each ending in a defined, recorded state. This discipline travels across whichever environment the project calls for.
What contact materials do you use for high-insertion-count fixtures?
Depends on the insertion count and the signal requirement. Gold plating, usually hard gold over nickel, suits low-current and low-voltage signals and high insertion counts, because the contact resistance stays low and the surface does not oxidise. Tin and palladium-nickel are the lower cost alternatives, used where the signal carries enough current and voltage to break through an oxide film and the required cycle life is lower. The choice follows from the insertion-count requirement in the test plan.
How do you plan support for regulatory traceability in the per-unit result?
The output format is defined against what your compliance requirement has to capture, and the per-unit record is designed to reach the plant's systems in a form they consume, which the traceability offering above covers. We do not hold or claim a specific regulatory certification ourselves.
What cycle time or throughput do your automotive test jigs achieve?
Throughput is derived against the part and the line rate at the design stage, so a figure from one station does not carry across to another.
How do you establish test coverage and build a fault-injection matrix?
Coverage starts as a list of the failure modes the station has to catch, taken from the design and from field returns, and each one is mapped to the test step that detects it. It is then verified on the built station by forcing those conditions through the fixture, a shorted pin, an open contact, an out-of-range supply, and checking that the station reports the expected failure. Anything that passes when it should have failed is a coverage gap, and it is closed before the station is accepted.
How do you catch a test station drifting after it has been running for years?
By having the station measure a known-good reference unit on a set interval and trending the result, so a slow change in contact resistance shows on that trend before it reaches the units, instead of surfacing as a batch of marginal parts blamed on manufacturing. On a station that was not built that way, we add the reference measurement and a scheduled check, along with an insertion count on the fixture, during refurbishment.
References
  • IEC 61010-1 — safety requirements for electrical equipment for measurement, control and laboratory use
  • ISO/IEC 17025 — the competence requirement that sits behind an accredited calibration, and the reason calibration is not ours to perform
  • IEC 61000-4 series — electromagnetic immunity testing, which a measurement station is designed to operate within
  • IPC-9252 — requirements for electrical testing of unpopulated printed boards
  • JEDEC JESD22-A104 — temperature cycling, used in burn-in and soak sequencing
Go deeper

Ready to scope this for your product?

Start with our engineering notes, or talk directly to the team that will build it.

Contact us Read our test systems notes