Quality Problems Found in the Marketplace

As the Takata airbag problem shows, neglecting quality can be damaging enough to destroy a company. The problem for Takata was the parts produced in Mexican factory.

I was also working at the Mexican factory at the time, and responsible for automotive components. I wasn't that confident in the quality of our products, so I felt that tomorrow would be our turn.

If a quality defect is found, the coverage of the defect is identified. In most cases, industrial products are designed so that they cannot be disassembled. As a general rule, all defective products are disposed of. Depending on the size of the case, a single quality claim can result in extraordinary losses of at least several hundred thousand dollars.

These costs include product disposal costs, sorting costs and emergency shipping costs for replacement products. When the coverage of defective products becomes large, it can have a significant impact on the management of the company itself.

The automotive industry has high demands for quality and safety, especially compared to other manufacturing industries, and "hiding problems" is not acceptable and cannot be done. Failure in quality can cost the company significantly in terms of money and credibility.
In the case of serious defects, not only the inspection and quality confirmation records of the product when it was manufactured, but also the computer data and email history will be thoroughly investigated.

We follow the concept of PL law. If the quality or function that should be guaranteed is not guaranteed, no excuse is acceptable. Lack of design verification or lack of control over the manufacturing process is not a reason.
Each department and Quality Assurance department conduct internal audits and there is a rule that only products whose quality is guaranteed are released to the market.

There are many different types of quality defects. They may be little more than scratches on the surface, wrong model on the product label, or serial duplication. Problems of this level are perfectly functional in terms of product function, but they are regarded as deviations from the specifications and subject to quality claims.

In severe cases, it is functional failure of the product. A short-circuit due to metal chips in an electrically controlled product or a defective withstand voltage in an energized part can lead to a complete functional failure. Since automobiles are also exposed to rain and dust, most automotive parts need to be waterproof and sealed. Therefore, poor sealing is also a severe quality defect.

If the inspection equipment is set up incorrectly or if someone is intentionally cheating, then the quality of the product that passes that inspection is not guaranteed, which is an unrecoverable problem. In order to prevent such failures, inspections must be carried out daily to ensure that they are carried out correctly. This is true not only for the final inspection process, but also for the entire production process.

These are the quality stories for the market and customers.

Quality Problems Found internally

At least, we should find those quality defects internally.

Defects detected in the process

This will not be a market problem. It will only increase our internal scrapping costs. Depending on the volume, if it goes beyond 10%, it is not in a position to produce. If you're a company owner, you don't know whether you're making a product to make a profit or whether you're making a defective product and only losing money.
There is no such thing as profit if there is a high defective scrap cost, especially if the raw material cost ratio of the product is high. This makes it difficult to know the purpose of producing.

Nevertheless, after mass production begins, we are busy with production. Even if there are many defects, we cannot stop production and investigate the causes. If this is not resolved in the short term, it will become a delivery problem and you will have to compensate for the loss of customer line shutdowns.

In the case of the automotive industry, this is also charged for hundreds of thousands of dollars to hundreds of millions of dollars of costs, as it will stop the final car manufacturer's line.

Defects not detected in the process

For example, something is wrong with the equipment judgement, or the settings are wrong, or the visual inspector notices something wrong with the product. These are problems that are undetectable or difficult to detect in the normal process. Often these problems are noticed after a large amount of product has already been produced.

Internal sorting will be performed, based on quality risk and its occurrence and impact. With a certain amount of experience, you will be able to make a correct decision on whether sorting is necessary or not and its quality risk.

The above are the risks of mass production.

As a production engineer, I have been involved in these quality issues many times. Occasionally, when you look at a production line, you will see that a production engineer is directly involved in causing a quality problem. They can't solve the process problem in the right way, so they cheat the equipment setup and pass it off as a good product. The more inexperienced people tended to take these easy steps.

It's a little disappointing to find out that some settings have been changed in areas that absolutely cannot be changed except engineers. People who understand the quality risks would not make these decisions. It would only make it harder for ourselves later.

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