Test Methods
Test method standards, developed by IEC, ASTM, and IEEE, define methods of testing performance, equipment, and quality in commercial and domestic products. These standards address the safety principles for refrigerators, other household appliances, and commercial electrical appliances and equipment.
IEC 62552-1 Ed. 1.0 b:2015
Household refrigerating appliances - Characteristics and test methods - Part 1: General requirements
IEC 62552-1:2015 specifies the essential characteristics of household refrigerating appliances, cooled by internal natural convection or forced air circulation, and establishes test methods for checking the characteristics. For the purposes of declaration, the tests defined in this part of IEC 62552 are considered to be type tests to assess the fundamental design and operation of a refrigerating appliance. This part of IEC 62552 does not define requirements for production sampling or conformity assessment or certification. This part of IEC 62552 does not define a regime for verification testing as this varies by region and country. When verification of the performance of a refrigerating appliance of a given type in relation to this standard is necessary, it is preferable, wherever practicable, that all the tests specified be applied to a single unit. The tests can also be made individually for the study of a particular characteristic. IEC 62552-1, -2 and -3 cancel and replace the first edition of IEC 62552 published in 2007. IEC 62552-1, -2 and -3 constitute a technical revision and includes the following significant technical changes with respect to IEC 62552:2007: a) All parts of the standard have been largely rewritten and updated to cope with new testing requirements, new product configurations, the advent of electronic product controls and computer based test-room data collection and processing equipment. b) In Part 1 (this part) there are some changes to test room equipment specifications and the setup for testing to provide additional flexibility especially when testing multiple appliances in a single test room.
IEC 62552-2 Ed. 1.0 b:2015
Household refrigerating appliances - Characteristics and test methods - Part 2: Performance requirements
IEC 62552-2:2015 specifies the essential characteristics of household refrigerating appliances cooled by internal natural convection or forced air circulation, and specifies test methods for checking the characteristics. This part of IEC 62552 describes the methods for the determination of performance requirements. Although there is some commonality in the set-ups for different tests (and so it may be an advantage to apply them all to one sample), these are separate tests to evaluate specific characteristics of the sample being tested. This part of IEC 62552 does not specify a procedure to generalise the results from sample test results to a prediction of the characteristics of the whole population from which that sample was selected. IEC 62552-1, IEC 62552-2 and IEC 62552-3 cancel and replace the first edition of IEC 62552 published in 2007. IEC 62552-1, IEC 62552-2 and IEC 62552-3 together constitute a technical revision and include the following significant technical changes with respect to IEC 62552:2007: - A cooling capacity test has been added in Part 2 (this part). - A pull-down test has been added in Part 2 (this part). - Performance tests have been added for wine storage appliances in Part 2 (this part).
IEC 62552-3 Ed. 1.0 b:2015
Household refrigerating appliances - Characteristics and test methods - Part 3: Energy consumption and volume
IEC 62552-3:2015 specifies the essential characteristics of household and similar refrigerating appliances cooled by internal natural convection or forced air circulation, and establishes test methods for checking these characteristics. This part of IEC 62552 describes the methods for the determination of energy consumption characteristics and defines how these can be assembled to estimate energy consumption under different usage and climate conditions. This part of IEC 62552 also defines the determination of volume. - All parts of the standard have been largely rewritten and updated to cope with new testing requirements, new product configurations, the advent of electronic product controls and computer based test-room data collection and processing equipment. - For more efficient analysis and to better characterise the key product characteristics under different operating conditions, the test data from many of the energy tests in Part 3 (this part) is now split into components (such as steady state operation and defrost and recovery). The approach to determination of energy consumption has been completely revised, with many internal checks now included to ensure that data complying with the requirements of the standard is as accurate as possible and of high quality. - Part 3 (this part) now provides a method to quantify each of the relevant energy components and approaches on how these can be combined to estimate energy under different conditions on the expectation that different regions will select components and weightings that are most applicable when setting both their local performance and energy efficiency criteria while using a single set of global test measurements. - For energy consumption measurements in Part 3 (this part), no thermal mass (test packages) is included in any compartment and compartment temperatures are based on the average of air temperature sensors (compared to the temperature in the warmest test package). There are also significant differences in the position of temperature sensors in unfrozen compartments. - The energy consumption test in Part 3 (this part) now has two specified ambient temperatures (16°C and 32°C). - A load processing energy efficiency test has been added in Part 3 (this part). - Tests (both performance (Part 2) and energy (Part 3 (this part)) have been added for wine storage appliances.
IEC/TR 61592 Ed. 2.0 en:2003
Household electrical appliances - Guidelines for consumer panel testing
Applies to panel testing household electrical appliances within the scope of IEC technical committee 59: Performance of household electrical appliances.
IEEE 1851-2012
IEEE Standard for Design Criteria of Integrated Sensor-Based Test Applications for Household Appliances
An integrated framework of the test software for household appliances is defined. This standard specifies the test environment and the test information as well as the means to acquire the information (either Web services or a data-exchange file). Additonal files are available at http://standards.ieee.org/downloads/1851/index.html
