Rigorous tests: You could drive for thousands of clicks or force yourself to trust software simulations. Then again, you could always put your faith in the myriad of new durability test rigs

摘要

A basic challenge lies at the heart of all automobile durability testing: how to replicate as accurately as possible the destructive loads on components, sub-assemblies, and even full vehicles, and to repeat the cycles often enough to reach failure point - all in the shortest possible time, Virtual testing can get over the time-compression hurdle easily enough, but it hasn't yet reached the stage where it can give suitably accurate predictions of wear patterns and failure modes. On-road testing is a theoretical ideal, but it's cumbersome, time-intensive, and attended by security concerns, meaning the laboratory rig is still an excellent compromise. It's also an area in which data from real-world testing is increasingly being melded with simulation techniques to not only more accurately reproduce in-service destructive forces but also shorten the time taken to extract meaningful results.