FMEA Action Plan Threshold (RPN) - Auditor says Action Plan for an RPN > 84

[Lena66]

our customer request the action must be done when RPN is over 70.

 

[vanputten]

I believe that the AIAG is a member of the IATF.

From the IATF website:
IATF members include the following vehicle manufacturers: BMW Group, Chrysler LLC, Daimler AG, Fiat Group Automobiles, Ford Motor Company, General Motors Corporation (including Opel Vauxhall), PSA Peugeot-Citroen, Renault, Volkswagen AG and the vehicle manufacturers respective trade associations - AIAG (U.S.), ANFIA (Italy), FIEV (France), SMMT (U.K.) and VDA (Germany).

It is my understanding that the AIAG "Core Tool" documents only become a requirement if specified by the customer. They are not a normative reference for TS 16949 - meaning they are not automatically a requirement for organizations subscribing to TS 16949.

"Risk" is often defined as the probability of occurrence (O) of harm and the severity (S) of that harm. Sound familair? If one looks at the 4th edition of the AIAG FMEA manual, from page 103 on, it explains why the use of an RPN threshold is NOT a recommended practice. Appendix C of the FMEA manual offers the idea of SO rankings.. Detection is often an after the fact screening control. Detection could be a prevention thing but I believe most organizations look at detection as an inspection to prevent escapes from getting to the customer. An SO perspective has more opportunity to be preventive in my opinion.

 

[vanputten]

I just happened to be reading page ii of TS 16949:2009. It makes no reference to AIAG being part of the IATF. Hmmmm. It only references the actaul US auto manufacturing companies of Ford, Chrysler and GM.

 

[Howard Atkins]

The US oversight body is IAOB and not the AIAG.
Some of the others ANFIA (Italy), SMMT (U.K.) and VDA (Germany) are also the oversight bodies IATF whilst the French now have IATF-France

 

[vanputten]

Hello Howard:

I don't think this posting has anything to do with FMEA's but I want to clarify that I made the postings about the IATF website and page ii of TS to support your point that the AIAG is not a member of the IATF. I was trying to show that there is a discrepancy between the IATF website and page ii of TS.

I am not sure what the "Why? Why not!!!!" means but I did not intend to frustrate you if I did.

 

[howste]

There is no threshold limit in the FMEA manual.FMEA manual is a guidance manual and not a mandatory one. >84 limit is not a requirement unless there is a CSR to that effect.It is the contract that decides all requirements and not the auditor.

Good point about the customer requirements. You always need to be familiar with what your customer has required. Several CSRs have requirements related to FMEA and RPNs that hint at or clearly go against what the FMEA 4th edition says. For example:

As a general rule, RPNs should be 40 or below. Processes showing RPNs over 40 must obtain formal written approval from your ATI SQE.

The PFMEA shall be used as a continuous improvement tool. Suppliers shall be able to document continuous improvement efforts derived from RPN rankings below their target value for improvement actions.

When not specified by end customer requirements, FNGP requires that any RPN number over 100 be addressed with an action plan for improvement. Use of the AIAG FMEA Manual as a guideline is suggested.

As a general rule, RPNs should be 40 or below. Processes showing RPNs over 40 must obtain formal written approval from your GM-FIAT Worldwide Purchasing SQE.

(My empasis added)

Other CSRs have no conflict with the new AIAG manual. Examples:

When the severity of a failure mode is 9 or 10, special attention must be given to ensure that the risk is addressed through existing design actions/controls or process preventive/correction action (s), regardless of the RPN. Once all severity rankings are lowered, the supplier team should be addressing other failure mode rankings in occurrence, and then detection.

Items found to have high severity and/or RPN’s require special attention and actions as appropriate to ensure product quality.

High rated RPN items should have “recommended” corrective action plans. At a minimum, the top 3 RPN’s should have corrective action plans.

Supplier shall set up a rating system in it's QM-system which identifies the priorities of recommended measures (e.g. RPN, Severity).

 

[Howard Atkins]

Hello Howard:

I don't think this posting has anything to do with FMEA's but I want to clarify that I made the postings about the IATF website and page ii of TS to support your point that the AIAG is not a member of the IATF. I was trying to show that there is a discrepancy between the IATF website and page ii of TS.

I am not sure what the "Why? Why not!!!!" means but I did not intend to frustrate you if I did.

Dirk,
I understood and my comments were not aimed at you and I apologize if this was taken as such. Looking at my post I do not understand what I meant.

 

[Howard Atkins]

Slightly

Some of these companies are writing for the sake of writing.

In the past it was used by small companies to show to the auditor that they were "developing" suppliers.

They are getting out of control and they are in most cases examples of meaningless verbal diarrhea
It would also help if they would read Development of Organization Customer Specifics related to ISO/TS 16949:2009 (including ISO 9001:2008) in the Automotive Supply Chain (Tier 1 & Sub-tiers) .

 

[brahmaiah]

Once upon a time, some organizations cooked up the magic RPN of 100. So, in the spirit of misguided improvement, the organizations felt that an RPN of 84 looked good. Misinformed customers imposing stupid expectations upon misguided suppliers. Have you ever seen the picture of the blind leading the blind? They're still running in circles...

Stijloor.

Your comments are too harsh.FMEA is a very good guidance text and not a specification or a standard.The user of FMEA has to decide Severity,accurrance and detection ratings according to his own experience in the field.Rating estimates vary from person to person and company to company.It is advisable to strictly follow a single scale given in the FMEA manual for each category.That way it will bring some uniformity in ratings given by differant people.
To fix RPM threshold as 100 or 84 or any other figure is entirely between the customer and the the supplier.
V.J.Brahmaiah

 

[Stijloor]

Your comments are too harsh.

They're honest.

FMEA is a very good guidance text and not a specification or a standard.

I did not dispute this. I teach and consult in FMEA.

The user of FMEA has to decide Severity, occurrance and detection ratings according to his own experience in the field.

Agreed.

Rating estimates vary from person to person and company to company.

Agreed.

It is advisable to strictly follow a single scale given in the FMEA manual for each category. That way it will bring some uniformity in ratings given by different people.

Disagree. Even if you have a "single scale" including descriptions, different people will rate differently. The idea is to reach consensus on ratings.

To fix RPM threshold as 100 or 84 or any other figure is entirely between the customer and the the supplier.
V.J.Brahmaiah

OK. If the customer wants an RPN of 84. What do you think the RPN's will be on the FMEA records that must be submitted as part of the PPAP? Exactly!! No RPN will be above 84!! It becomes a rigged multiplication exercise to ensure that the result will always be 84. No attention will be given to high severity rankings; severity X occurrence results conveniently ignored. And so it goes.

Stijloor.