diff --git a/DDTest/src/test_bitfieldcoder.cc b/DDTest/src/test_bitfieldcoder.cc
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..9cf87da13e3b74d1c06e3d5a490b9cd80a73f35f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/DDTest/src/test_bitfieldcoder.cc
@@ -0,0 +1,58 @@
+#include "DD4hep/DDTest.h"
+#include <exception>
+#include <iostream>
+#include <assert.h>
+#include <cmath>
+
+#include "DDSegmentation/BitFieldCoder.h"
+
+
+using namespace std ;
+using namespace dd4hep ;
+using namespace DDSegmentation ;
+
+// this should be the first line in your test
+static DDTest test( "bitfield64" ) ; 
+
+//=============================================================================
+
+int main(int /* argc */, char** /* argv */ ){
+    
+  try{
+    
+    // ----- write your tests in here -------------------------------------
+
+    test.log( "test bitfieldcoder" );
+
+
+    // initialize with a string that uses all 64 bits :
+    const BitFieldCoder bf("system:5,side:-2,layer:9,module:8,sensor:8,x:32:-16,y:-16" ) ;
+
+    // set some 'random' values to bf2 
+    long64 field = 0  ;
+    
+    bf.set( field, "layer",  373 );
+    bf.set( field, "module", 254 );
+    bf.set( field, "sensor", 202 );
+    bf.set( field, "side",   1 );
+    bf.set( field, "system", 30 );
+    bf.set( field, "x",      -310 );
+    bf.set( field, "y",      -16710 );
+
+
+    test(  field , long64(0xbebafecacafebabeUL)  , " same value 0xbebafecacafebabeUL from individual initialization " ); 
+
+    // --------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+
+  } catch( exception &e ){
+    //} catch( ... ){
+
+    test.log( e.what() );
+    test.error( "exception occurred" );
+  }
+
+  return 0;
+}
+
+//=============================================================================