Storage life modeling and analysis for contacting slip ring based on physics of failure

The storage life of the contacting slip ring in the inertial navigating platform cannot be easily estimated because of the difficulty of obtaining field data. This paper proposes a new approach about the storage life modeling and analysis for the contacting slip ring based on the combination of failure mechanism and statistical data. The analysis of failure mechanism shows that the increase of contact resistance caused by the stress relaxation of brushes and organic thin-film growth leads to the storage failure of the contacting slip ring in most cases. Based on the microscopic contact and thin-film electrical conduction mechanism, the relaxation resistance and thin-film resistance growth models are developed, which can transform the failure data of contact resistance into the storage life data. Some measures are presented to extend the storage life of the contacting slip ring through the life prediction and analysis of critical factors.