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Hello, all. This is not necessarily a quality systems question, but more so an outreach for advice from those who may have at one time been in my shoes. I am battling an onslaught of broken and lost gages; an issue that has been worse in the last year than all of the previous years combined. Any advice would greatly be appreciated. Below is a snapshot of my situation:
1. Our company has grown no less than 30% per year since its conception; and in fact, last year was more on the lines of 50% growth. Having that said, the problem (opportunity) grows exponentially.
2. We are a QS-9000 company (working on TS), so all gages are maintained in a calibration system. We also have a weekly audit (random department) to ensure all gages are in their designated area and are functional.
3. 100% of all new hires go through orientation, part of which is proper gage usage, application, and storage.
4. Currently, we have gages that are assigned to inspection areas, which are used by all personnel within that department. Manufacturing is responsible for ensuring the quality of their product.
5. If a gage is lost or broken, no one knows what happened and there is no accountability, which I hope to change.
The following are suggestions that I have received so far and where I hit a wall when it comes to implementing any of them:
Suggestion 1: Hire roaming inspectors responsible for in-process checks and issue gages to them. Issue: Indirect labor is an indicator for profit/loss measurement. In addition, we are a job shop on a very large scale (10000 different part numbers); we would have to have several inspectors per department for setups and in process.
Suggestion 2: Assign a gage box with required tools to each machine to help track what gages were used by whom. Issue: Because of the nature of our business, and operator may run three to four (or more) machines daily and it would still be difficult to track who actually damaged/lost them.
Suggestion 3: Assign a gage to each person and hold them accountable. Issue: We don't currently have enough gages to go around and all gage purchases come out of my budget (which isn't great). In addition, the Plant Manager does not believe in holding the operators financially accountable.
Suggestion 4: Have each team leader (or supervisor) assign gages at the beginning of every day and collect them at the end of the day. Issue: Our ME doesn't like this due to the lost production time and efficiency.
So, that pretty much sums it up. Again any advice would greatly be appreciated!
1. Our company has grown no less than 30% per year since its conception; and in fact, last year was more on the lines of 50% growth. Having that said, the problem (opportunity) grows exponentially.
2. We are a QS-9000 company (working on TS), so all gages are maintained in a calibration system. We also have a weekly audit (random department) to ensure all gages are in their designated area and are functional.
3. 100% of all new hires go through orientation, part of which is proper gage usage, application, and storage.
4. Currently, we have gages that are assigned to inspection areas, which are used by all personnel within that department. Manufacturing is responsible for ensuring the quality of their product.
5. If a gage is lost or broken, no one knows what happened and there is no accountability, which I hope to change.
The following are suggestions that I have received so far and where I hit a wall when it comes to implementing any of them:
Suggestion 1: Hire roaming inspectors responsible for in-process checks and issue gages to them. Issue: Indirect labor is an indicator for profit/loss measurement. In addition, we are a job shop on a very large scale (10000 different part numbers); we would have to have several inspectors per department for setups and in process.
Suggestion 2: Assign a gage box with required tools to each machine to help track what gages were used by whom. Issue: Because of the nature of our business, and operator may run three to four (or more) machines daily and it would still be difficult to track who actually damaged/lost them.
Suggestion 3: Assign a gage to each person and hold them accountable. Issue: We don't currently have enough gages to go around and all gage purchases come out of my budget (which isn't great). In addition, the Plant Manager does not believe in holding the operators financially accountable.
Suggestion 4: Have each team leader (or supervisor) assign gages at the beginning of every day and collect them at the end of the day. Issue: Our ME doesn't like this due to the lost production time and efficiency.
So, that pretty much sums it up. Again any advice would greatly be appreciated!

