This part of IEC 60300 serves as an application guide to a reliability stress screening process for electronic hardware. The concept, purpose and justification of the screening process are explained. The main elements of a screening programme are stated, together with the general planning procedure. This standard is intended as a guide and should be used in conjunction with one of the IEC reliability stress screening standards, ("tools" in the toolbox concept), referenced in clause 15, based on the screening process application level.

This standard gives guidance in cases where it is essential that early failures be removed from the items manufactured in order to deliver them to the customer when the problems causing the early failures are solved. The standard also gives guidance on where the reliability stress screening should be carried out, i.e. component level, subsystem level, or system level (see figure 1 ), and can also be used where steps to reduce the risk of early failures are included in a contract.

This standard is aimed at personnel in the contract department, project management, product development, process management, production, quality control and purchasing.