Reasonable calibration? 50 foot measuring tape and other basic M&TE

RoxaneB

Super Moderator
Super Moderator
#11
Ah...it's so nice to see that I'm not the only one who has experienced this quandry. I've come to the conclusion that the Cove is my professional therapy group. Hi...my name is Roxane and I work in Quality....

This is where you're all supposed to say "Hi, Roxane..."

Anyway, I worked in a job where a similar situation was encountered but internally. The result was the development of a program to inspect and verify our tapes.

Daily, the operators were responsible to inspect their tapes for damage, bends, dents, dings, missing paint, scratches, etc.

Twice a year, QC was responsible for doing ye old push/pull method on all tapes to a standard bloc and ensuring that the tapes were still measuring to within tolerance.

Of course, this programme only came about once we hashed out the differences between calibration, verification, and inspection...a project unto itself.

And then determining the acceptable tolerance for tapes....1/8" for production workers, and 1/16" for design and manufacturing engineers. I never did get a good answer why my tape measure had more stringent tolerances than the guys who built our product.
 
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K

Katydid

#12
Speaking of when "necessary", we use an inspection record sheet that states that a length check only requires a calibrated gage if it is a tighter tolerance than plus or minus 1/16 inches. See attached for information. My company has been registered for a little over 2 1/2 years, and we have also completed our transition from 1994 to 2000.
 

Attachments

#13
Cool

Mike S. said:
pilchard,

I respectfully disagree if you mean always. The standard says "Where necessary to ensure valid results, measuring equipment shall be calibrated...against measurement standards traceable to international or national measurement standards...". I believe a reasonable person would not find it "necessary to ensure valid results" to calibrate traceable to NIST a 50' tape measure in the example Icy gave even if it were used for final acceptance. As proof I would show that I have done this for x years and my customer has never complained about my length being wrong (assuming this to be the case), that I understand the application, and therefore that I know there is no need. How could the auditor prove me wrong? If he could find CAR's for bad length attributable to the tape, yes, he has a (strong) point. Otherwise, if he pushes it I'm gonna have to speak to his boss. Sure, on a micrometer it is a cheap piece of cake to buy a calibrated jo-block and do the cal traceable to NIST, so why not. But imagine the cost of a NIST traceable cal for a 50" tape measure!

This is JMO of course.
If you have a documented validation of the 50' tape with a calibrated caliper from that NIST Jo-block your 50' tape is traceable to NIST.

Just document the chain.
 
G

Graeme

#14
pilchard said:
If you have a documented validation of the 50' tape with a calibrated caliper from that NIST Jo-block your 50' tape is traceable to NIST.
I would like to toss in a clarification -- "traceability" to a national standards laboratory (NIST for example) is a property of the measurement result, not the object that is measured. That is, the reported value and its uncertainty (50 ft +/- 0.01 ft, for example) are traceable, not the tape measure itself. An object, process or organization can never be "traceable" because they are not the results of a measurment.

Reference: International Vocabulary of Basic and General Terms in Metrology (ISO, 1993) item 6.10
 
R

Randy Stewart

#15
Jay,
That would be the easiest way I agree, however, we require them to have specific tools - it's in the UAW Contract and goes along with the agreed upon training. So getting them out of the building is not an option.
Currently we have over 1500 mics, calipers, height gages, etc. in the system and only the personnel in receiving and inspection use them for "quality" related checks - everything else is reference. Along with the tolerances we work with in prototype, it is all muda.
We are working on a program and I'll keep you posted.
 

CarolX

Super Moderator
Super Moderator
#16
RCBeyette said:
Twice a year, QC was responsible for doing ye old push/pull method on all tapes to a standard bloc and ensuring that the tapes were still measuring to within tolerance.
Hi Roxanne....my name is Carol and I work in Quality....LOL

Just a thought on this...why not toss them out and replace them twice a year. Wouldn't that be cheaper?

CarolX
 

RoxaneB

Super Moderator
Super Moderator
#17
CarolX said:
Hi Roxanne....my name is Carol and I work in Quality....LOL

Just a thought on this...why not toss them out and replace them twice a year. Wouldn't that be cheaper?

CarolX
For the amount of time it takes to do a push/pull test, no. The owner of a tape measure thankfully had enough discipline to bring in their tape when their sticker's date told them to. Why throw out a perfectly good tape?

But, this was about 3.5 years ago and maybe they've started tossing them by now. ;) It would be a cool event at the company picnic....Ye Old Tape Toss! :vfunny:
 
#18
thanks for listening

Since I started this I thought I'd weigh in. This was not an actual single occurance, but a summary of several different confrontations with 2nd or 3rd party auditors. It was brought back to the surface by a QMS consultant that I interviewed last week, who pointed out the tape as an example. What makes this kind of behaviour so frustrating is that all of the folks represented in this scenario had glossed right over major quality system findings (e.g. wimpy internal audits, poor document control, surface cause only corrective action, etc.) that would have resulted in real improvements to the customer's satisfaction.

The point being (I think I had one?) that when executives get exposed to this kind of easily argued but totally irrelevant sort of audit finding it reinforces their opinion that all of this quality stuff is nonsense. Generally, the execs know where the weak spots are that offer significant negative contribution to the customer joy. When the auditors miss those and focus on minutiae, the executive BS alarm begins to sound.

BTW, my response to the last Poindexter that started down the calibration overkill path (on a parts counting scale used to issue nuts and bolts to assembly) was: "That device does not need to be calibrated to ensure valid results in our process. Do I make myself clear? Move on." He did. Experience and authority are useful tools.
 
N
#19
I fought the law

Yep, been there done that. Unfortunately, at a few stations my guys do measure the length of pipe. So I have a few "red cased" numbered tapes that get quarterly checks and a ton of silver "general purpose tapes" that do not. If I had a dime for every time that I had to point out to an auditor that a tape pretty much has to destroyed before it will be out by more than 1" in 16'. Furthermore, tapes can not be calibrated. Calibration is adjustment to a measuring device that brings it into agreement with a known standard. What adjustment can be made to a tape? All you can really do is periodically inspect them to assure no damage and that they are still legible. What a waste of precious QA resources.

This stuff does indeed make us look stupid to senior management. For poor lazy auditors it is far easier and way less confrontational to write up a measuring tape than it is to challenge the validity of a CA or the effectiveness of audits or training. Too many auditors take the easy road.
 

Al Rosen

Staff member
Super Moderator
#20
Neil said:
Calibration is adjustment to a measuring device that brings it into agreement with a known standard. What adjustment can be made to a tape?
Calibration can be just checking against a known standard, not neccessarily adjustment.
 
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