The long awaited ASTM E18-07 Rockwell Hardness Standard has been released. While it is technically similar to the older version, some changes affect both users and service providers.

Shigeo Shingo introduced the concept of poka-yoke (pronounced POH-kah YOH-kay) in 1961, when he was an industrial engineer at Toyota Motor Corp. The initial term was baka-yoke, which means fool proofing.

Monitoring temperature and/or humidity conditions is an essential ingredient of a wide range of quality assurance applications. There are many common methodological errors, however, in ways that this task is approached that either compromise quality standards or add unnecessary time and expense to the monitoring task.

Ultrasonic nondestructive testing (NDT) is a versatile technique that can be applied to a variety of material analysis applications. While ultrasonic NDT is perhaps better known in its more common applications for thickness gaging, flaw detection and acoustic imaging, high frequency sound waves also can be used to discriminate and quantify some basic mechanical, structural or compositional properties of solids and liquids.

Computed tomography systems for industrial applications, such as R&D, production and quality, can see inside parts and quantify characteristics normally inaccessible to probing or optical sensors. The same dataset can be used to inspect the structure of material, such as porosity or wall thickness; measure external features; and generate fully surfaced or solid computer-aided design (CAD) models.

In the past, calibration and compensation have been considered strictly quality issues. Today, adopters acknowledge that calibration and compensation directly relate to substantial improvement in throughput because feed rates can be set higher when machines are known to be in tolerance. As a result, calibration and compensation of computer numerical control (CNC) machine tools is becoming routine, particularly in shops producing parts for the aerospace and medical industries.

Noncontact measurement and inspection is a fundamental practice in many manufacturing environments and quality control labs. Understanding the available options is a continual learning process as the power of video and the PC, as well as other advancements, constantly change and improve. As measuring experts continue to leverage these technology advances, more system choices have emerged.

When the data to be analyzed for a Six Sigma project is flowing into other software systems, how do you chart it? This is a challenge for many quality-focused, variation-minded professionals.

It’s been more than 10 years since GE’s aggressive adoption of Six Sigma launched a renaissance of quality methods, and some 20 years since Motorola first began minting Black Belts and concentrating on defects. And yet, despite hundreds of documented successes and thousands of committed Six Sigma practitioners, criticism of and skepticism about Six Sigma remains as strong, and probably stronger, than ever.

Force gages are universal and versatile measuring instruments used across all industries. As its name suggests, a force gage is used to measure the force during a push or pull test. Applications exist in research and development, production and quality laboratory environments.