Difference between First Article Inspection and incoming inspections of regular parts

[Osen]

Hi all,

I'm working on developing an internal QC process at my company and was wondering how you typically handle incoming inspection of parts. I noticed that forms for AS9102B seem to be set up for a single part. In the event of sampling a percentage of parts from the order, are additional pages of Form3 just created?

Also, for orders after the first FAI, is the inspection still considered an FAI or does it follow another name? What is your procedure for inspecting regular incoming parts? Do you just trust your vendors each order? Do you perform a visual inspection only? Is the inspection a less detailed form of the FAI? I understand these procedures will vary a lot between industries.

Thank you.

 

[3DDave]

The more you inspect the more you are likely to know. Some companies prefer ignorance. FAIs seem universal, but production part acceptance varies from near 100% inspection to picking a few dimensions on a few parts to see if the process is consistent. An FAI should be performed on any change in the process, but that usually doesn't happen. I've seen considerable variation because the day-shift guy cleans the chips off the fixture and carefully aligns the part and then night-shift guy just slaps the blank somewhere close before clamping it down onto a bed of curly metal shavings.

The main feature I missed as a design engineer was getting any feedback from inspection. If a part has features that are near the limits on the FAI it would have been less a surprise when later parts failed to fit as the process drifted and those features went out. Another "feature" was when some item had been working fine and suddenly did not - usually because the original part was very close to nominal and the later parts were at the extreme end of the zones; zones which had not been properly analyzed (typically on externally sourced designs.) So, suddenly, a part which always worked and for which the drawing had not changed, no longer worked.

Likewise the aggregation of variation information - for all the precisely located holes, how far from nominal are they? What's the variation in diameter for drilled holes between 0.125 and 0.500? Essentially, in-house and procurement-wide process capability. Frankly it seemed to me that putting features where they ought to be was far more precise than called for on the drawing, but garbage datum references meant that the location was specified from the wrong features and this caused endless trouble.

 

[Inspection Girl]

First Article Inspection is the inspection of new parts or existing parts with a revision (change). Usually you will inspect at 100% of first articles for a number of Lots, or time. Up to you. This is used to prove in these new or changed parts and to consider your vendor a trustworthy company to make these parts for you. Regular incoming parts are that have already been proved in and are on a skip lot inspection or sample inspection.

 

[IRstuff]

First Article, by definition, is the first of its kind, and as such, requires essentially anything from 100% inspection to full re-qualification. Our company tends to be on the other end of this; most of our work is from development to first article test, which often includes design verification testing as well as environmental testing. If there are changes in the production part, then it'll depend on whether the change is substantial enough to warrant a complete first article test.

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