Ah, China,
I have had some experiences with implementing PPAP documentation in China.
I can say to you that this was a real nightmare.
A lot of mails going out (documents, manuals, practical examples, changed documents with comments and notes,....), and comming in.
Each time, we replied to their questions, we got another reply with more questions to the answers that were given...
At the end, we decided to do it like this:
- Process flowchart (we just got them to describe in their own words how they made the product, with the knowledge we made build up during the process audit)
- Dimensional results (we did them ourselves, and communicated the changes needed to the product, products were changed in china, re-send and re-measured,...)
- Control Plan (we made that ourselves, based on the communciations that we had, and ofcourse on the process audit results we did in the production location).
-
FMEA, we declared to the customer that he could see it in China (as we were certain that he would not make a trip to China to verify the FMEA for this product).
- Gage R&R, we conducted it ourseleves during the process audit in China.
- All other documents like sourcing decision, materials,...,and all other documents were an extract of the total assembly.
If your Chinese company never filed a PPAP submission before, and their core business is not automotive, consider doing things yourself, or take a two weeks Chinese trip to explain them everything into detail, and help them submitting all documents.
Nothing against LCC's to purchase parts from, but on QS's, in some cases, they have a long road to go....
I do not want to discourage you with my "bad" experience. I'm sure that a lot of other China suppliers can deliver the req. documents.
Just sharing my experiences...
Good luck.
