FielDrive radtests
The French company Alstom is CERN’s provider of FielDrive chips. In 2012, CERN purchased 4’000 FielDrive chips, all coming from the exact same batch: 1132A. CERN has validated the batch by testing at the Fraunhofer facility.
The different equipment groups have been testing FielDrives under radiation, usually along with other components on their boards, like for example: Cryo at CNGS in 2009, Complete WorldFIP chipset at CEA in 2006, Cryo at TTC2 in 2002.
Although so far there has been no suspicion for its vulnerability up to 400 Gy, because of its critical role in mid 2013 it was decided to perform dedicated tests on the component alone.
For the tests CERN provided 15 FielDrive chips, randomly selected among those 4’000. The target was confirming that the batch’s TID limit is above 400 Gy. The Test Results confirm that this target was met.