If you are evaluating automated leak test stations for your line, you are usually trying to solve one of three problems: leaks escaping to the customer and driving PPM, an operator-loaded bench test that cannot keep up with takt, or the need for serialized data on every part instead of clipboards and sample plans. We build the station around whichever is biting you hardest.
AMD Machines has designed custom test and inspection systems for more than thirty years, with over 2,500 machines delivered. An automated leak test station from AMD is engineered around your part — its geometry, sealing surfaces, internal volume, test pressure, target leak rate, and cycle time — and integrated with the controls and traceability your customers and auditors expect.
What is an automated leak test station?
An automated leak test station is a production machine that leak-tests every part without an operator manually loading, sealing, and reading an instrument. It presents the part to a sealing fixture, clamps it under repeatable force, pressurizes or evacuates it through a calibrated path, executes a stabilization-and-measurement sequence, and routes the result — pass, reject, or fault — to a sorter, conveyor, or robot.
Compared to a bench tester, an automated station:
- Seals the part identically every cycle, eliminating operator-induced variation
- Runs at a fixed, deterministic cycle time, so testing never becomes the bottleneck
- Captures serialized data — every part, every reading, timestamped — for SPC and traceability
- Enforces 100% inspection rather than sampling, which is what modern PPM targets require
How an automated leak test station works
- Part identification — barcode, DataMatrix, or RFID read at infeed; no scan, no test.
- Load and seal — the part lands in a rigid nest; pneumatic or servo clamps drive sealing tooling under controlled force.
- Fill — air or tracer gas flows in through a calibrated path to the target test pressure (typically 0.3–10 bar).
- Stabilization — a controlled hold lets adiabatic heating dissipate; the single most important phase for repeatability.
- Measurement — the instrument records pressure decay, flow rate, or tracer-gas concentration against reject thresholds.
- Vent and unload — controlled exhaust, the fixture opens, and the part routes to pass, reject, or rework.
Done well, that sequence repeats every few seconds with Gauge R&R under 10% of the reject threshold. The difference between that and a tester that "passes everything in the morning and rejects everything by afternoon" is fixture design, stabilization sizing, thermal compensation, and instrument selection — exactly the engineering AMD does in-house.
Leak test methods compared
| Method | Best for | Typical sensitivity | Typical instruments |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pressure decay | Rigid castings, valve bodies, small–mid cavities | 0.1–1 sccm | CTS Sentinel, ATEQ F5/F520, Uson, InterTech |
| Mass flow | Large volumes (>~300 cc), flexible plastic parts | to ~0.01 sccm | CTS, ATEQ mass-flow series |
| Helium tracer (vacuum chamber or sniffer) | Hermetic enclosures, refrigerant and fuel components | 1×10⁻⁵ sccm and below | Inficon, Pfeiffer Vacuum, Agilent |
| Forming gas (5% H₂ / 95% N₂) | High-volume tracer testing at lower gas cost | ~1×10⁻⁶ sccm | INFICON Sensistor |
Many production stations combine two methods — a fast pressure-decay gate on every part with scheduled helium audits, or mass flow for the main cavity and pressure decay on a secondary circuit. We size the method to your reject threshold with measurement-system margin, not the other way around.
Key components of an AMD leak test station
- Leak-test instrument — CTS, ATEQ, InterTech, Uson, or Inficon mass spectrometer, sized to sensitivity, volume, and pressure
- Sealing fixture and nest — rigid tooling, hardened locating surfaces, low-compliance sealing geometry, calibrated clamp force
- Gas-handling skid — instrument-grade regulators, filter-dryers, and valve manifolds (SMC, Festo, Parker) plumbed for minimum dead volume
- Controls and HMI — Allen-Bradley CompactLogix/ControlLogix or Siemens S7-1500, with FactoryTalk View or WinCC
- Safety system — dual-channel circuits per ISO 13849, interlocked guarding, and pressure-relief design for tests above 7 bar
- Sortation and data — pass/reject diverters, reject-bin lockout, and serialized logging to your MES
- Optional vision and marking — machine vision inspection for pre-test verification and part marking and traceability for post-test serialization
Configurations we build
- Standalone benchtop or pedestal stations — operator-loaded gates for low-volume, high-mix work
- In-line single-station testers — integrated with powered conveyors via lift-and-locate or walking-beam indexing
- Rotary-index stations — 4–8 positions splitting load, fill, stabilize, test, and vent so takt beats test time
- Multi-lane parallel testers — multiple fixtures sharing one instrument (or one each) when test time exceeds takt
- Robot-tended cells — a robotic cell loads, tests, and sorts, often combined with assembly or dispensing
- Combination test cells — leak plus functional test, vision, or marking on one platform; see our end-of-line test systems
Integration, controls, and traceability
"The green light was on" no longer satisfies customers or auditors. Every AMD automated leak test station ships with:
- Per-part serialized records — part ID, test pressure, stabilization time, reading, result, operator, timestamp
- Real-time SPC — X-bar/R, Cpk, and rule-based trend alarms on the HMI, configurable per part number
- MES integration — OPC UA, MQTT, ODBC/SQL, or REST push to Rockwell FactoryTalk, AVEVA, Ignition, SAP, or a custom historian
- Recipe management — part-number-driven setup loads clamp force, pressure, stabilization, and thresholds on barcode scan
- Audit-grade reporting — controlled access and exportable test reports for quality engineering reviews
Industries we serve
- Automotive — valve bodies, manifolds, fuel and brake components, EV battery enclosures and cold plates
- Heavy equipment — hydraulic blocks, fuel rails, cooling systems, gearbox housings
- Aerospace and defense — fluid lines, actuators, and sensor housings held to FAI and PPAP requirements
- Electronics — sealed connectors, IP-rated enclosures, battery packs
- Appliances and consumer products — refrigeration circuits, pumps, water-handling components
Throughput, cycle time, and ROI
When we scope a station we walk through four things: required sensitivity versus cycle time (which decides single-station versus rotary or multi-lane architecture), your PPM target and escape cost (which set the measurement-capability floor — we target Gauge R&R under 10% of the reject threshold), the labor an automated station displaces across shifts, and the scrap you recover by catching drift in real time with SPC. We will not put a fabricated payback number on this page — bring your volumes and quality costs and we will ground the business case together.
Why AMD Machines
We are not an instrument reseller bolting a CTS or ATEQ unit to a frame. We engineer the entire station in-house — mechanical, electrical, controls, fluid power, vision, and data — against the part on your bench and the takt on your floor:
- 30+ years of custom automation and 2,500+ machines delivered
- Fixture, thermal, and stabilization engineering that designs out false rejects before runoff
- Gauge R&R proven against known-good and known-bad master parts before shipment
- One supplier for the assembly automation, machine vision, and marking systems the tester integrates with
Have a part, a target leak rate, and a takt time? That's enough to start. Request a quote or send us your part print and we'll scope the station around it.