Check out the April 2020 edition of Quality: Quality Professional of the Year, color management, understanding the role of load cells, automation and much more!
The problem would go away only to return every few months. The manufacturing mystery continued for about seven months, with each failure costing $26 in raw material alone.
Load cells are an integral part in a force measurement system. Understanding load cell terminology, common sizing techniques, and how they function will help you choose the most appropriate load cell for your application, which will help prevent accidental damage due to an incorrect selection.
If you’re in manufacturing, no matter the industry, quality is top of mind. It must be, or you won’t be in business long. Yet, with all the focus, there are big misses all the time in companies large and small, which leads to an interesting question: If quality gets so much attention, why are recalls still increasing? Further, what can we do about it?
Uniformity has long been associated with quality perception, and color can be one of the most striking visual giveaways if products are inconsistent. As a result, consumers are more likely to associate these color flaws with inferior, low-quality products or brands.
The warmth of spring brings flower and green lawns, and it also brings awards and recognition to the quality profession. Recognition abounds; both Quality Magazine and ASQ have dedicated significant time and resources promoting, validating and now honoring individuals who have made a significant impact to the quality community.
East meets west. It’s a common idiom that has been around for so long that it has evolved to both express agreement and collaboration as well as to describe polar opposites, and just about everything in between.
When ISO has a quality management standard revision to release, there is much anticipation—and perhaps a bit of apprehension—among users as to the significance of the changes.
As a supplier of all types of measuring instruments, we are regularly asked to quote the cost of repairing some of them. In days gone by, it was a common service offered by many in the industry but modern technology has changed all that while increasing the amount of garbage to the local landfill. Marketing and manufacturing are both to blame.
With so much focus on customers, companies can lose sight of their most valued asset—their people—and the critical roles they play in the success of their organizations. Organizations are the employees, and customer service and quality are dependent on these skilled, motivated people.
Mike Terrell is the quality assurance manager at B&B Airparts Inc., a machine shop that specializes in manufacturing high precision parts for aerospace OEMs. B&B Airparts Inc. has been in business for over twenty years, offering machining, sheet metal fabrication, and assembly capabilities.
The testing can be used in a pre-production environment as companies evaluate changes in materials designed to improve the characteristics of end products.
Materials testing and characterization is often a lengthy process. It can take more than a year and billions of testing cycles for a manufacturer to characterize the properties of a new metal alloy to be used in a critical application, such as a component of an automotive or jet engine.
In the automotive industry, quality control/assurance has often focused on the physical testing and evaluation of raw materials and finished products. From a safety perspective, it is imperative that the strength of these materials and products meets established standards. Tensile, compression, bending and hardness tests are used for these evaluations.
Electroless nickel (EN) is industry’s most common plated finish. It’s widely used for applications that demand wear resistance, hardness and corrosion protection—particularly if parts have complex geometries. It is also used in PCB manufacturing within a process known as ENIG, electroless nickel immersion gold.
When we talk to customers who are interested in learning more about XRF, there are some questions that we answer all the time. Check out some of the most frequently asked questions and their answers below.
Eddy current testing (ECT) is an electromagnetic testing technique used to inspect non-ferromagnetic materials, and eddy current array (ECA) is an advanced form of ECT that allows efficient scanning over larger areas.
Breakthroughs in materials, electronics and manufacturing techniques have led to innovations that have greatly expanded the capabilities of borescopes.
Of all the various NDT disciplines, it is safe to say that remote visual inspection (RVI) is the one most widely used across all industries. While radiography and ultrasonic testing, for example, are essential in certain situations and applications, there is no real substitute for being able to visually inspect and monitor the condition of internal components.
At its simplest, automation means to make something automatic. In manufacturing, whether describing a single device or an entire system or process, automation refers to performing one or many tasks autonomously with minimal or even no human interaction in a manufacturing or production environment.
The renewed interest for vision guided robotics (VGR) for the manufacturing of parts and packaging of goods is much in part to the number of advances in sophisticated technologies over the last decade.
As developments in machine learning and the Internet of Things (IoT) impact how manufacturers run their businesses, automation can support these changes and boost productivity.
Manufacturing often involves the fabrication of products that are made up of multiple smaller parts or components. Assembling these parts into finished products can be complex and labor intensive.
Manufacturing is becoming automated on a broad scale. The technology enables manufacturers to affordably boost their throughput, improve quality and become nimbler as they respond to customer demands. Ultimately, this helps them become more efficient.
Robots in manufacturing is not a new idea. But today an increasing number of collaborative robots are joining the ranks, working alongside their human coworkers.
Artificial intelligence is here, and it is can improve quality in a number of ways. It can prevent bad parts from being made, discover trends, and monitor machine performance.
Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs) are the latest innovation that have been transforming traditional robot tasks through increased flexibility and diversified applications, including their unique ability to navigate in an uncontrolled environment with a higher level of understanding.