Has anyone heard of Run at Risk?

Metlablady

Registered
This is a increasingly used (almost daily) method at the plant I am in currently.
Production upper management deciding to "run at risk" while awaiting completion of first piece inspection. Blaming it on urgency to ship.
First piece has to include a check on the CMM which takes longer than just the dimensional gaging.
 

blackholequasar

The Cheerful Diabetic
This does not make a very good business model. If you're pressed to ship, the issue is obviously in planning. If you don't want to address the planning and 'run at risk' you organization also runs the risk of product failure and loss of customers. Quality should always come first but sadly that is not always the case. I have worked at places where inspection has been foregone in favor of shipment and then we get an RMA for the non-conforming parts. But if top management does not stress the importance of quality, it's like bailing out a sinking ship with a paper cup.
 

Metlablady

Registered
This does not make a very good business model. If you're pressed to ship, the issue is obviously in planning. If you don't want to address the planning and 'run at risk' you organization also runs the risk of product failure and loss of customers. Quality should always come first but sadly that is not always the case. I have worked at places where inspection has been foregone in favor of shipment and then we get an RMA for the non-conforming parts. But if top management does not stress the importance of quality, it's like bailing out a sinking ship with a paper cup.
Thank you. I feel the same way. I have been in Quality a long time. Sadly I am not in a position to change anything on that end of production. I just haven't heard that term put to use the way it has here nor understand the thought behind it.
 

Golfman25

Trusted Information Resource
If you're confident in your processes, then you shouldn't have too many issues. You can run and check at the same time. If your not confident or your processes have issues, then it's probably better to check before you run. So the question is, how many times do you end up with bad parts during the "run at risk" time frame?
 

Metlablady

Registered
On the raw material side there is a positive recall setup for incoming that gets used right off the truck. Everything is held and marked until verification is done.
On the mfg. turn side the risk is much greater. If the parts are run they will not be able to rework and are subject to 100% sort or scrap or possibly a deviation accepted.


Thank you all for taking the time to post. Your insight is appreciated.
 

Mike S.

Happy to be Alive
Trusted Information Resource
As long as your Management understands the risk and follows the rules if the parts turn out bad (as opposed to shipping them anyway) there is not much you can do. This is risk and opportunity management. Yes, they should look into planning and try to eliminate the need, but how many things can we say that about?
 

ScottK

Not out of the crisis
Leader
Super Moderator
Run at Risk has been standard in most places that I've worked.
But there have always been controls around it and it has been formalized.
If it's used on a daily basis all year round, then there is something wrong with your production planning. That may be out of your hands so I suggest proposing a "Run at Risk" SOP that's clear about who can authorize RAR and what are the actions to verify the product after the fact.
 
This requires a good traceability system in place as well. You will need to isolate the occasional bad shipment by individual product pieces, rather than "taking back everything since the issue was discovered". So really you would be running under "positive recall". We do this often, especially when the customer wants delivery "now", or when we get backed up and are running up against a shipment deadline.
 

Matt's Quality Handle

Involved In Discussions
Honestly, how is this different than sampling inspection?

If you're checking a critical feature hourly for example, you are "running at risk" in the 1 hour interval between checks. Standard practice is that if it fails an hourly check, everything run in the prior hour is suspect. I would hope that a failure on your CMM layout would trigger a similar reaction.
 
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