Hello - what I'm about to expound on is rather graphic, I hope your sitting down....and send any small children out of the room.
For over 30 years I worked in the OEM automotive supplier sector. I recently left that rather stressful world and now work at a company that makes products for the material handling and components for consumer appliance industries. To say this is a "whole nother world" is a massive understatement.
This facility has had numerous gaps in the management team, particularly in quality - over the last 3 years. Consequently any systems that were in place have deteriorated significantly are no longer exist at all. During my interview & tour, we walked through what I assumed was a hallway / storage area that happend to have a granite surface table and Height Stand in the middle of it....I was told "this is our QC Lab"....at which point I froze in shock.
Many of our material handling products do not have tolerances on the customer's blueprints, so we apply what has historically worked - and use tape measures to check product. Our consumer components do have tolerances on the blueprints, most of which we are not capable of achieving. Often times when we reject product, I am over-ruled by the general manager and the product is released to ship. The phrase "that's good enough" is applied to the majority of these cases...I've never seen anything like it.
We do have some gauges, most of which are aluminum plates with grooves milled into them, or they have 1/4" pins in various locations that sort of allow us to check part "shapes". There are no gauge blueprints available, so we have to compare them to the customer drawings. I did manage to measure pin locations on one of the gauges using the surface plate and height stand (X & Y coordinates), but most of the gauges are too large to measure using this method. I did have an opportunity to ask a management team member who previously served as quality manager in years past - "how did you calibrate gauges?" He said they simply measured the 1/4" pins for wear and visually looked for any physical damage, and then stuck a "calibrated" sticker on the gauge.
As for support - we are VERY limited. We do have a tool room machinist, but he does not have the ability to make or repair gauges. There is also no financial support for the refurbishment / replacement of gauges. We are truly in the dark ages.....I'm sure you have a sense of that by now.....
I am trying to come up with a rationale regarding our calibration system. I am trying to justify why our sloppy gages are sufficient to meet our customer's needs. We never really get any customer rejections for dimensions & tolerances, more for poor welds and paint finish. Can an argument be made based on quality history....meaning the lack of issues related to dimensions? Could I classify our gauges as "visual aids"....?
Thank You for your input....
For over 30 years I worked in the OEM automotive supplier sector. I recently left that rather stressful world and now work at a company that makes products for the material handling and components for consumer appliance industries. To say this is a "whole nother world" is a massive understatement.
This facility has had numerous gaps in the management team, particularly in quality - over the last 3 years. Consequently any systems that were in place have deteriorated significantly are no longer exist at all. During my interview & tour, we walked through what I assumed was a hallway / storage area that happend to have a granite surface table and Height Stand in the middle of it....I was told "this is our QC Lab"....at which point I froze in shock.
Many of our material handling products do not have tolerances on the customer's blueprints, so we apply what has historically worked - and use tape measures to check product. Our consumer components do have tolerances on the blueprints, most of which we are not capable of achieving. Often times when we reject product, I am over-ruled by the general manager and the product is released to ship. The phrase "that's good enough" is applied to the majority of these cases...I've never seen anything like it.
We do have some gauges, most of which are aluminum plates with grooves milled into them, or they have 1/4" pins in various locations that sort of allow us to check part "shapes". There are no gauge blueprints available, so we have to compare them to the customer drawings. I did manage to measure pin locations on one of the gauges using the surface plate and height stand (X & Y coordinates), but most of the gauges are too large to measure using this method. I did have an opportunity to ask a management team member who previously served as quality manager in years past - "how did you calibrate gauges?" He said they simply measured the 1/4" pins for wear and visually looked for any physical damage, and then stuck a "calibrated" sticker on the gauge.
As for support - we are VERY limited. We do have a tool room machinist, but he does not have the ability to make or repair gauges. There is also no financial support for the refurbishment / replacement of gauges. We are truly in the dark ages.....I'm sure you have a sense of that by now.....
I am trying to come up with a rationale regarding our calibration system. I am trying to justify why our sloppy gages are sufficient to meet our customer's needs. We never really get any customer rejections for dimensions & tolerances, more for poor welds and paint finish. Can an argument be made based on quality history....meaning the lack of issues related to dimensions? Could I classify our gauges as "visual aids"....?
Thank You for your input....
