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“The industry is really lagging behind the rest of the world as far as being automated and coming up to speed. Most of the companies that are operating in the metal finishing industry in the U.S. and around the world are still operating are still back where they were back in the 1950’s and 60’s. There’s a lot of technologies out there that’s reached other aspects of the industry that’s upgraded other aspects of manufacturing that hasn’t been accepted or used in the finishing industry. Products and finishing coatings are really lacking behind where they should be in terms of consistency and quality.”Joe Radzvilowicz, Senior Vice President, METALAST
Manufacturing and Engineering Concerns“Engineers need to become aware that they’re not necessarily going to get process control unless they require it in their specifications. Not everybody is using it. Do they just want to trust that things will come out right or do they want to have control over the process?”
“When you’re engineering and designing product you’re interested nowdays in zero defects. And having that product go forward and be the same and be perfect every time. There’s automotive recalls, keeping market control, reliability.”
“If engineers will specify process control and insist that the work that they’re getting from their suppliers has that element, it will give them the best possible practice that they can get for their company.”
Issues that Effect Consistency and Repeatability“When your dealing with companies with multi shift operations with many different operators running the same jobs, often different operators will develop there own little techniques. What I’ve found is that in any given shop is that there’s the process that’s on paper, there’s the process that management thinks that the company is using that deviates from the paper but they think is the reality, and then there’s what the operators are actually doing, which is different. There’s often three different processes.”
Perhaps in the past, manufacturers and primes have accepted the subtle differences between operators, but in the future that’s going to change. It’s already starting to change.”
“We don’t want to admit it, but I think that being human is an admission that we’re not machines. Parts sit in tanks a little longer than it should, the chemistry of the tanks gets out of control…”
“Factors that can compromise quality include temperature, pH’s, titrations, as well as immersion times. When you factor in the human element, there’s a lot of room for error”.
“Do I run it for 10 minutes or do I run it 11 minutes? Does the machine automatically shut off at the end of the sequence or do I have to go and pull the parts out? Did that happen while I was on break?”
Rejects, Quality Concerns, and Failing Parts“Rejects have just seemed to be a part of life for years, and there’s all kinds of interesting stories about what has happened to rejects. The main thing is that rejects are a cost. Rejects prevent you making other parts if you have to redo them. They cause delays in shipment to your customer. They possibly cause damage to the parts that is irreparable, and therefore more delays to your customers. It’s just not a lean way to go. If you think it’s expensive to improve your process, you should start counting the costs of all the rejects. Doing it right the first times is always the most inexpensive way to operate. Investment is a critical element in our survival, and we realize that expense will pay back dividends for generations to come.”
“In some cases we have to re-work the part, in some cases we have to pay for the part. The standard in the industry is 3 times processing. That doesn’t necessarily make your customer happy. If they have a $5,000 part and you’re charging them $100 to process the part, are you going to pay them $300 to scrap it out? It doesn’t work that way.”
“My comment is that you always seem to have to strip the part and re-plate them, but why is it that you don’t have enough time to get your plating baths and chemistries sorted out in the front end of the process? You don’t want to have any of your products fail during use because it can be catastrophic. It doesn’t have to be a space platform or a hubble telescope, it can be right back here on earth.”
“You might get $.50 to plate and if it has bad plating on it that causes a functional issue with the assembly, the assembled product that it goes into. Maybe it goes into something like a car or a camera system. Some big expensive piece of equipment that is then sold to that customer’s customer and goes out in the field and if it doesn’t work right, you can see the impact. Quality is important right down to every nut and bolt.”
The Need for Process Control“Customers are demanding quality at the least possible price. So, the least possible price means process control.”
“Th Job security and process control go hand in hand because process control is going to be necessary for success. If a company’s not successful, nobody is going to have job security. Anybody with a quality or industrial engineering background will tell you that manufacturing is all about controlling variability. How much does your process deviate from the norm? What are the limits of that deviation and how do you reduce it? Specifications, dimensions, coating thicknesses, colors, you name it. Process control is the answer to controlling variability. It is the answer.”
“If you want to be a leader, and you want customer repeatability in delivering parts to you, you have to have process control.”
“The role of process control is extremely critical. It’s probably the most critical part of the process. In my opinion, if you don’t have process control, nothing else matters. If you don’t have good control of your baths you’re going to get different thicknesses of deposits and different hardness. You have to have process control. Only the companies that have good process control will be able to compete. Companies who don’t have good process control will be competing against companies offshore, and we all know that story. You can’t compete with that.”
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“It effects consistency greatly, because you have different operators with their own tribal knowledge and little black books, doing things their way. Most of the time it works, but sometimes it doesn’t. I’ve seen to many mistakes being made by the operators. We give them the right training and the right equipment, and there are still mistakes.
e whole trick is moving this technology to the other end of the scale and getting it into the job shop world. That’s where there’s a huge amount of work done across this country. As far as an overall improvement in quality across this coutry, that’s how it’s going to happen. It’s not going to happen in the robotics shops that make one, and only one, product.