Leak Detection on Automotive Parts

With the variety of parts that need to be tested within a car comes also a huge range of leak rate requirements. While engine blocks have quite basic demands in regards to leak tightness, safety components as air bag ignitors have very high requirements in regards to leak testing. Due to the more and more strict regulations in regards to emission, fuel components also need to be leak checked with higher sensitivities.

Due to this wide range of applications, different leak testing technologies are used within this industry. This starts by basic methods as bubble bath test and goes till high sensitivity and high speed automated helium leak testing.

A majority of parts in the past were tested with pressure decay methods. But nowadays the more strict regulations bring pressure decay to its limits for many components so that more and more parts are tested with helium leak testing. A possible alternative to avoid a tracer gas such as helium can also be Pfeiffer Vacuum’s micro-flow technology which enables higher sensitivity and lower influence of environmental effects like temperature.