Some similar items are to be independently life-tested under “typical” conditions. The interest is in predetermining a length of time such that the probability is at least a specified amount that an item will survive this long. A random lower bound for this time is to be evaluated from preliminary independent life-tests on a few items, combined with supplementary information. The time to failure for an item is assumed to have a lognormal distribution. The testing conditions are the same for the items to be life-tested later. However, the few items tested first might be subjected to different conditions. A consensus of these conditions furnishes the “typical” conditions. The few observations are used to allow for mean effects, and an upper bound (perhaps rough) for the variation effects is provided by the supplementary information. The resulting bounds can have strong advantages over use of at-statistic when only two or three items are considered initially.