Advanced Quality Planning with ISO QIF

Modern manufacturing involves a rigorous and complex maze of processes that ensure the final quality of the product. Generally categorized within the domain of Advanced Product Quality Planning (APQP), these byzantine procedures include Production Part Approval Process (PPAP), Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA), Measurement Systems Analysis (MSA), and Statistical Process Control (SPC). The APQP processes ensure that a robust quality system is put into place for mass production that controls for both design and process risks and is monitored for manufacturing stability on an as-needed basis.

This process is extremely cumbersome to carry out, often generating 100+ pages of documentation even for a part as simple as a bolt – much of the documentation being hand-written notes. With the digitization of manufacturing, there exists a better way.

Leveraging Model-Based Definition (MBD) and ISO Quality Information Framework (QIF, ISO 23952:2020), leading manufacturing companies have digitized this process. The result is a far more streamlined process, a quality process with fewer manual errors, and a quality process with far more repeatability and reliability. In addition, the as-built measurement results from the actual parts are maintained in the QIF standard, making the data available for Big Data analytics.

In this paper, we will explain the typical APQP processes seen across various manufacturing verticals, and we will discuss how these previously manual processes can be digitized using MBD, QIF, and software. We will discuss the benefits of encoding manufacturing processes like APQP into software, resulting in a more predictable and repeatable business.