Package Testing in Huntington Beach, Southern California
Smithers Pira operates a well equipped package and product testing laboratory in Huntington Beach, Southern California. This transit testing laboratory provides pre-shipment testing of packaged products and durability testing of unpackaged products. The laboratory also performs integrity assessments for terminally sterile medical packaging. Smithers Pira has been an International Safe Transit Association (ISTA) Member since the 1990s and the laboratory is ISTA Certified, as are the laboratory team members (including Certified Thermal Professional (CTP) Level 2).
Package testing and product testing involves subjecting a packaged or unpackaged product to the physical rigors of real life hazards, under controlled laboratory conditions. This involves: vibration testing simulating road, rail and air transit; shock testing and drop testing representing manual and automated handling and in-service shock events; compression testing representing warehousing storage and compressive forces arising during shipment and use; thermal testing and climatic conditioning covering regional or global conditions, from elevated temperature and humidity to sub-zero conditions; and reduced pressure (vacuum) testing representing the effects of high altitude or reduced pressure air-freight shipments.
For terminally sterile medical packaging there is a need to demonstrate that the manufacturing, transit and storage environments do not compromise the sterility of the pack. For terminally sterile packs laboratory transit testing is followed by an integrity assessment involving gross leak detection (ASTM F2096) and dye penetration (ASTM F1929) testing. Further details of post-test integrity assessment are provided below.
Huntington Beach Package and Product Testing Laboratory
Market Sectors
Our Huntington Beach laboratory was established in 2004 to support Southern California's medical industries. Medical, pharamceutical and healthcare continue to be key sectors for the lab, but the lab's scope has broadened to provide package testing services to high-tech product sectors including displays, lasers, instrumentation, and consumer and industrial electronics; food and beverage, and consumer products.
The laboratory regularly conducts thermal and climatic package testing for the medical and healthcare sector, including instrumentation and devices, but importantly also the cold chain industries for temperature sensitive products (TSPs). Our proximity to leading companies in the medical field means we have the critical knowledge required to serve this important sector.
Client services include product fragility testing, vibration testing, packaged product pre-shipment testing and thermal package testing. The laboratory team are also well positioned to undertake vibration and shock field data recording and test protocol development.
Package testing services include both standard testing (using methods such as ISTA 3A and 3E or ASTM D4169), and tailored test programmes based on our extensive supply chain knowledge and field data gathering. Tailored projects regularly revolve around packaging improvement, validating more innovative products or packaging components, and reducing costs and damage. The laboratory is also equipped to perform reduced pressure testing representing the effects of high altitude in accordance with ASTM D6653.
Post-test integrity capability (ISO 11607)
Post-test integrity services at Huntington Beach include gross leak detection (ASTM F2096), dye penetration testing (ASTM F1929), seal strength testing (ASTM F88), determination of leaks by bubble emission (ASTM D3078) and visual inspection (ASTM F1886). Huntington Beach also provides accelerated aging conditioning for medical packaging, referencing guidance from ASTM F1980.
Smithers Pira's Huntington Beach team is well equipped to support clients with the package performance elements of ISO 11607, the internationally recognized umbrella standard for validating terminally sterilized medical devices and packages. ISO 11607 is formatted in two parts:
Part 1: Requirements for materials, sterile barrier systems, and packaging systems
Part 2: Validation requirements for forming, sealing, and assembly processes.
Our testing services are focused on section 6.3 Packaging-system performance testing and section 6.4 Stability testing of Part 1 of ISO 11607.
Team Expertise
The laboratory team includes consultant and test engineer staff members, providing a mix of real life supply chain knowledge with laboratory experience across the range of packaging materials and sectors. The team has a combined experience of more than 30 years in packaging and testing.
The laboratory has two ISTA Certified Packaging Laboratory Professional (CPLP) Technologists: Andrew Volmensky and Nickell Keeling. Nickell Keeling is also a CPT (Certified Thermal Professional) level 1 and Luis Gill is a CPT Technician.
Contact Address
15361 Electronic Lane
Huntington Beach, CA 92649
Tel: (+1) 714 892 9747
Fax: (+1) 714 892 9601