A new web-based dashboard enabling the rapid analysis of global quality data has been launched by Hexagon's Manufacturing Intelligence division. It is designed to help quality professionals easily identify trends in declining quality for parts and assemblies and investigate the issues relating to specific components, suppliers, projects and locations.
"Because quality control processes at separate production facilities are typically disconnected, it can be challenging for global manufacturers to achieve accurate and detailed analyses of quality issues linked to specific components, suppliers, projects and locations," said a company spokesperson. "Through a highly visual web-based quality dashboard, the solution enables quality professionals to intuitively analyze aggregate data at a glance from any web browser and rapidly identify cases that require urgent intervention."
Manufacturers that build complex assemblies must ensure that final products can be seamlessly constructed from thousands of parts from suppliers and in-house production facilities around the world. For example, the automotive body in white (BIW) comprises rear-end panels and wheel housings made by different suppliers at different global assembly plants. While the quality of parts and assemblies can be confirmed with inspection as the BIW moves through production, many manufacturers do not have global visibility that makes it possible to spot emerging issues linked to specific projects or locations, or to pinpoint parts from suppliers that are consistently out of tolerance. The new dashboard presents an overview of a site and project from which the user can drill down into hierarchical layers of detail about a project's components. Powerful data aggregation capabilities make it easy to compare design data, such as the CAD geometry of a car door with inspection data for the manufactured door and associated door components across several locations.
The solution is underpinned by Hexagon's vendor-agnostic Q-DAS eMMA MDM (measurement data management) software, which acquires metrology data from every production site to provide a single source of quality data. The data can then by interpreted by locally installed and web-based quality tools such as the new dashboard to analyze trends in dimensional accuracy and utilize quality data collected at multiple locations. The solution manages data throughout the manufacturing process so that tools can automatically compare inspection data to design data to ensure that manufacturers adhere to original design intent as parts are received, produced or assembled.
The Q-DAS eMMA Q-Board enables quality professionals to intuitively analyze aggregate data at a glance from any web browser. The dashboard's interactive visualization enables users to navigate from a CAD assembly and click through to components and their associated quality parameters, including tolerance deviation, CP, CPK, the degree of fulfilment and others. Quality data is presented through a color-coded "traffic light" user interface that supports the rapid detection of cases that require urgent action trends in key performance indicators to accelerate decision making. Dashboards can visualize data according to various aggregation criteria, such as location, project, functional group or analysis, feature, characteristic and more. Users can also filter their view based upon factors such as tolerance parameters and build phase, providing additional levels of customization to meet the requirements of specific production environments.
For more information contact:
Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence
250 Circuit Drive
North Kingstown, RI 02852
401-886-2000
www.hexagonmi.com