What this calculator does
It calculates the ratio of modeled life at a lower use temperature to modeled life at a higher test temperature, then divides target use exposure by that factor.
When to use it
Use it when a single thermally activated chemical or material degradation mechanism is represented by an Arrhenius relationship. Do not use temperature alone for fatigue, mechanical overload, radiation, or a mechanism that changes at the accelerated condition.
Inputs and formula
Temperatures must be in kelvin. Activation energy is in electron volts, and the Boltzmann constant is 8.617333262 × 10−5 eV/K.
AF = exp[(Ea / k) × (1 / Tuse − 1 / Ttest)]Equivalent test time = target use exposure / AFWorked example and interpretation
With 298.15 K use temperature, 358.15 K test temperature, 0.7 eV activation energy, and 10,000 target hours, AF is about 95.998 and equivalent accelerated duration is about 104.169 hours.
Practical notes and limitations
Activation energy is not a universal material constant. Obtain it from mechanism-specific evidence or fitted data, verify temperature uniformity, and check for melting, phase change, seal damage, or another competing failure mode. This result provides no sample size, confidence bound, or qualification decision.