Need help with tool wear measurement. AS9100D audit.

Midas969 · Feb 6, 2018

The company I work for just finished the stage 1 audit for AS9100. When asked how we checked for tool wear i said just a visual check. He said that was no good. I do have a 10X lupe. He said that's "okay", but said other shops use a Shadowgraph. Seems like overkill for a small shop like ours. I was thinking about a 30X stereograph. Cost is an issue. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

John Garner · Feb 6, 2018

A couple of quick thoughts:

Many years ago, we ground the flat at the tip of a toolbit to single-point a Unified / ISO Metric threadform by first grinding the 60-degree flanks to a sharp edge, then measured the overall length of the sharp tool before grinding away the point to remove the correct amount. (1/8 x Pitch x Cosine 30 degree for an internal thread, 1/4 x Pitch x Cosine 30 degree for an external thread) Some variant of the same concept to measure tool-tip shortening as a function of wear might work for you.

For something "more sophisticated", USB microscopes are cheap, and some of them come with image-measurement software. An improvised microscope stand with a compound-slide tool holder could made a reasonable works-alike for a toolmaker microscope.

Larry Dickman · Feb 6, 2018

tell them you fired them from a sling shot, and see how far they'll stick into an auditor.

Never heard anything like this. Sounds like someone did a piss poor job on your manual.

DDoug · Feb 6, 2018

....by checking the finished parts ?... :nutter:

litlerob1 · Feb 6, 2018

Tool wear is really none of their business, unless that has been included by the team that hired the Auditors (insert Selfie here).

The constraints of How are not their problem. I mean you could use a Cheese Grater to make parts, so long as it is a Calibrated one from Bed, Bath and Beyond.

What they should be concerned about is contamination primarily. And that means contamination of paper work, cutting fluids, hand washing station, material certs., QC procedure, Cutting tool Alloys even, but How you build a part is your business.

It isn't even ISO. It's internal.

R

boslab · Feb 6, 2018

You obviously specified it in your QA plan so it follows you must either remove it or measure it, seems like measure is easier, it would appear if your into internal assessments, which can be included if they are specified externally, auditors make it thier buisness I've found, sounds like your company is big enough to stump up for an optical projector, for thread gears etc they are well worth the money, I bought a couple of projectors off suburban tool, not as expensive as I thought and very good they were.
If you have to measure it you have to, end of it really,
I used to cheat and use plug guages to draw a template, easy just remember to rotate the plug to the helix angle (!)
Mark

newtonsapple · Feb 6, 2018

Auditors sometimes ask a specific question as a probe to look at how your whole production/quality system operates. Now the auditor might be an idiot and asking about details of tool wear, but you should answer the question systematically.

1) Inspect tools for wear/damage prior to running - Not an absolute control, but reduces downstream problems.
2) You machine parts
3) You have an inspection plan, first article, incremental sampling, maybe 100% on high risk features. This is where you detect tool wear.
4) If your run larger volume production you come up with a system to track tool life and establish statistically supported tool life projections and replacement cycles.

DDoug · Feb 6, 2018

newtonsapple said:
3) You have an inspection plan, first article, incremental sampling, maybe 100% on high risk features. This is where you detect tool wear.
4) If your run larger volume production you come up with a system to track tool life and establish statistically supported tool life projections and replacement cycles.

Timken developed a bunch of this way back when.

Dan from Oakland · Feb 6, 2018

Worn tools can make perfectly good parts- your answer should have been that you inspect the parts made by the tool against the specifications on the part documentation.

You were sucker punched. If you have a procedure for measuring tool wear, then point the auditor to the work instruction and then let him ask questions related to that.

Its all about documenting what you do and doing what you document. Hope this helps.

Newtonsapple's response is spot on.

PeteM · Feb 6, 2018

As noted above, sampling of the parts is the ultimate test of tool wear.

That said, it's useful -- especially for long runs and/or expensive parts -- to have a good idea of tool life ahead of time. Sometimes cheaper to swap out tools on some schedule before you start making bad parts.

Flank wear is easily measured with a stereo microscope and reticle. Crater wear can sometimes be measured with a tiny point on an indicator/stand. Run enough cycles to figure out when you want to swap tools. Failure is usually imminent at some fairly predicable level of flank/crater wear; assuming you avoid build up on the insert.

Wouldn't do that unless it's a really long run. And probably wouldn't put it in an ISO document.

CarbideBob · Feb 7, 2018

While this is AS which is tougher than ISO I have never seen this question asked.
Perhaps a good answer is wear is determined by tracking part size change from when the tool was new.
An optical compartor is going to have a very hard time measure a few microns or even tenths wear, accurate gauging will catch it.
Actual cutting size is what counts so you could have flank wear that is increasing tool force and deflection while the view on a optical device may show no size change at all.

Soon I get my first experience with a IATF certification audit. ( which replaces the TS-16949 automotive standard )
Not looking forward to that as I am hearing bad and crazy stories from some others about this new system.
Bob

Midas969 · Feb 7, 2018

Thanks for the responses. I feel like every auditor has their own pet pievs. This guy saw a company use a Shadowgraph and got a hard on for it.

newtonsapple · Feb 7, 2018

Yeah, sometimes auditors get stuck on things. Explain how you have found that not to be an effective way to control part output and here are all the other effective controls that you use instead. Now if you wrote or said that you don't need to inspect a dimension because it is controlled by the tool, you have stepped in it and need to have very tight monitoring on the tool form.

How common is the term shadowgraph referring to and optical comparator anyways? I had never heard the term, but knew (I think?) what you were talking about.

Could be worse. Sometimes it is your idiot quality manager that get stuck on something. His idea suddenly becomes the solution to any question the auditor comes up with and gets incorporated into the audit report. Then the quality manager goes waving about saying the auditor says we need to do this or else. Engineering doesn't have the bandwidth to implement the new requirement so we hire a consult to generate the required report, which in title satisfies what the quality manager wanted, but in substance is a thorough, rational, and exhaustive justification for not doing any of what the quality manager wanted because it didn't make sense in the first place. $25K later and few hundred pages of paper wasted and you are back to where you started.

yugami · Feb 9, 2018

Do you have a process that states you do this?

As a certified lead auditor unless you state you do it or you fail to meet the standard the auditor is overstepping

john-san · Feb 13, 2018

Midas969 said:
The company I work for just finished the stage 1 audit for AS9100. When asked how we checked for tool wear i said just a visual check. He said that was no good. I do have a 10X lupe. He said that's "okay", but said other shops use a Shadowgraph. Seems like overkill for a small shop like ours. I was thinking about a 30X stereograph. Cost is an issue. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

That is really an odd question. I've never "measured" and insert, end mill or any other tool for wear at a "customer", I've always measured the part. Only when a new grade, edge prep or coating was brought in did we do a side by side test of the old vs new to see how it compared and how much wear was imposed on the new tool.
Do you check the tool to see if its worn, and make adjustments in the control offsets, or do you check the part and make those changes?

Like yugami said there is something either in place for the process or he is exceeding his boundaries.

one horse · Feb 16, 2018

when asked that question. you should have answered Iballed with 10x loop wich he oked.

boslab · Feb 16, 2018

I think what the auditor was actually asking was do you use statistical process controll charts to monitor machine output, as tool wears the measured value of the dimension will move towards the lower control limit etc which is how tool wear was monitored on a production process, when it reached control limit the tool should be replaced, (tool wears parts get bigger)
Just somthing I read on one of those Lloyds courses they made us go on
Mark

CarbideBob · Feb 17, 2018

boslab said:
I think what the auditor was actually asking was do you use statistical process controll charts to monitor machine output.....
Mark

Does an auditor have the right to ask such a question?
He/She checks the system for compliance and is not a manufacturing engineer saying this is they way to do it.
Bob

Larry Dickman · Feb 17, 2018

CarbideBob said:
Does an auditor have the right to ask such a question?
He/She checks the system for compliance and is not a manufacturing engineer saying this is they way to do it.
Bob

another thing to keep in mind with auditors. It's not like a government audit where if you get stuck with a looser you've got big problems. THEY work for YOU. If you don't like them, you can simply FIRE them. It may not be in your best interest to do so, but you are in no way stuck with having to tolerate a looser.

In this case, I would have had my QC manager make a call to our registrar to have them straighten him out. If he insisted on this nonsense, the second call would be to have him removed.

Tonytn36 · Feb 17, 2018

CarbideBob said:
While this is AS which is tougher than ISO I have never seen this question asked.
Perhaps a good answer is wear is determined by tracking part size change from when the tool was new.
An optical compartor is going to have a very hard time measure a few microns or even tenths wear, accurate gauging will catch it.
Actual cutting size is what counts so you could have flank wear that is increasing tool force and deflection while the view on a optical device may show no size change at all.

Soon I get my first experience with a IATF certification audit. ( which replaces the TS-16949 automotive standard )
Not looking forward to that as I am hearing bad and crazy stories from some others about this new system.
Bob

Had our first IATF last year. It's a significant change from TS16949 and it is a bear of an audit. You are correct in not looking forward to it. There are many, many changes from TS-16949. One significant one is that you must now record your mastering deviation. This is one that I think has blind-sided the industry a bit and is proving difficult to implement, as most existing measurement software solutions do not include this ability.

Need help with tool wear measurement. AS9100D audit.

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