PRODUCT WARRANTY AND QUALITY CONTROL.

When a product is sold with a warranty, the manufacturer incurs additional costs in the form of warranty servicing costs. Owing to quality variations in manufacturing, some of the items produced do not meet the design specification and are labelled as defective (or non-conforming) items. The warranty servicing costs for such items are high and can be reduced through a weeding process. This paper deals with life testing as a means to weed out defective items being released, and examines the optimal testing period for three different types of warranties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]