Consistency tests for key comparison data

Results of International Key Comparisons of National Measurement Standards provide the technical basis for the Mutual Recognition Arrangement (MRA) formulated by Le Comite International des Poids et Mesures (CIPM). With many key comparisons already completed and a number of new key comparison experiments currently under way, we now have a better understanding of the statistical issues that need to be addressed for successfully analysing data from key comparisons and making proper interpretations of the results. There is clearly a need for a systematic approach to statistical analyses of key comparison data that can be implemented routinely by all participating laboratories.The determination of a key comparison reference value (KCRV) and its associated uncertainty and the degrees of equivalence are the central tasks in the evaluation of key comparison data. A satisfactory definition of a KCRV, however, is based on the assumption that all laboratories are estimating the same unknown quantity of the common circulating artefact, that is, the results from the different laboratories are mutually consistent. In this paper, we compare a number of statistical procedures for testing the consistency assumption.

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