Environmental conditioning is a process of subjecting a test specimen to various temperature and humidity conditions in order to determine the effect of these conditions on the test specimen. Often this conditioning is conducted prior to other tests such as mechanical or package performance testing in order that the test specimen be exposed to a full range of potentially harmful temperature and humidity levels. Distribution testing is a term used to ascertain the ability of a product / package system to withstand the rigors of the storage and distribution environment from a simple series of laboratory tests. This is accomplished by subjecting the product / package systems to a variety of inputs such as impact, compression, vibration, and altitude or other significant environmental input.

The sequence of inputs is designed to simulate the actual distribution process while the amplitude of the input is designed to simulate a three sigma maximum level from the anticipated environment. This process has been described as bringing the hazards of the distribution environment into the laboratory.

The above process, if it followed carefully, will result in a product / package system known to survive the distribution environment rigors. Unknown in this process is the degree of over packaging built into the existing systems. The optimum product / package system consists of components of known ruggedness in a package which offers sufficient resistance to environmental hazards without over packaging. Without a thorough understanding of product ruggedness, this optimization is not possible.

Westpak can assist you in all areas of supply chain optimization regardless of the type of product and/or package system currently being used.