High quality is a key characteristic that motivates consumers to buy a product. This is why every manufacturing company, regardless of the industry, must constantly strive to improve it. One way to achieve this goal is through proper quality control inside the plant.
Table of contents
- What is quality control?
- Quality control in manufacturing and its role
- How to plan and introduce quality control?
- Quality control – short summary
What is quality control?
Before going on to discuss what exactly quality control is and what quality management really means, it is important to clarify the meaning of quality. In a nutshell, quality refers to whether a product conforms to the standards that the manufacturer set at the beginning of the manufacturing process .
In order to achieve the desired quality of the final product, it is necessary to supervise the input materials and to control the entire production process. Often, however, quality management of raw materials and production line does not guarantee the required quality of the final product. So what are the ways to manage quality assurance of finished products?
This requires appropriate quality control procedures not only during the manufacture of the products but also during transport, storage, and distribution. The simplest forms of quality control in manufacturing are based on self-monitoring. By contrast, the most complex ones rely on in-depth analysis of product parameters with the use of state-of-the-art technology.
According to the older approach to quality management, quality control was only to eliminate products whose characteristics deviated from the accepted standards and thus prevent defective products from reaching end customers. Nowadays, however, in line with TPM (Total Productive Maintenance), manufacturing quality control requires manufacturers to have an in-depth understanding of the manufacturing process and to make modifications to it in order to improve the quality of products, ensure continuity in quality control processes and detect defects earlier.
Quality control in manufacturing and its role
Of course, quality standards are mainly introduced to improve quality assurance. They also contribute to reducing losses resulting from the manufacture of defective products, which, instead of going to customers, must be disposed of or manufactured again for their quality to be improved. Such defects can be the result of a wide variety of events, as it is important to remember that every, even the simplest manufacturing process carries the risk of error.
Defective products can be produced as a result of a machine malfunction, an error made by the line operator or a defective batch of raw materials. Such situations cannot, of course, be completely prevented and should be included in the costs of running production. However, it is necessary to identify the areas of manufacturing that are key to product quality and focus quality assurance efforts on them.
Modern quality control, which relies on advanced production management systems, makes it possible to monitor and analyse the production process on an ongoing basis. This, in turn, not only translates into higher product quality but also allows earlier detection of all kinds of errors and machine faults on the production line.
Skilful and thoughtful quality management gives the manufacturer confidence that the products it offers to customers comply with the requirements. This has a positive impact on the brand image and makes it more likely that a person who is satisfied with a product will also choose to buy another product from that manufacturer in the future.
Modern quality control in manufacturing not only eliminates product defects, but also prevents them. As a result, fewer raw materials are wasted during production. Moreover, earlier detection of machine failures means less line downtime.
How to plan and introduce quality control?
Sometimes companies do not want to implement quality control for fear of the costs involved. However, it is worth remembering that low quality of the production process also generates heavy costs. They are associated with losses of raw materials, time and a decrease in customer satisfaction, which ultimately leads to lower sales and company revenues.
Fortunately, however, more and more companies are recognising the benefits of introducing quality control in manufacturing. When implemented thoughtfully, this solution can be balanced in such a way that it not only helps to improve the quality of production, but also to meet the company’s business goals.
So, how to plan and implement quality control on site? The first step should be a thorough analysis of the company’s current situation in terms of quality. It is important to consider in which area the most common product quality problems occur, and what measures have been taken so far to address them.
Once the analysis stage is done, you can proceed to creating proper documentation, which will become the basis for the introduction of statistical process control. First of all, it should include quality standards that have been defined for each product. The documentation must also contain information on the method of quality control, the number of batches tested, staff training and on the system for reporting errors and defects.
The final step is to develop quality control procedures which will clearly define scenarios for handling the detection of product defects. They must include information on whether production is halted after defects are detected, whether the entire batch of products or only the defective items are rejected, etc.
Quality control – short summary
Quality control in manufacturing is an integral part of the entire manufacturing process. If it is implemented in an appropriate and well-thought-out manner, you can achieve a significant reduction in production costs, while at the same time raising product quality standards. Before introducing quality control in a company, you should take some steps, for example prepare appropriate documentation and develop procedures to define scenarios in the event that an error occurs, or a defective product is detected.
Modern machinery can be extremely helpful in quality assurance, by allowing you to manufacture products to the highest standard. If you are planning to expand your production machinery fleet or would like to upgrade one of your existing machines, feel free to contact Unilogo via our contact form. Please also visit our website at www.unilogo.com.pl, where you can find some of the projects we have delivered to our customers.
