Thursday, July 31, 2008

ESCS staff joins Criss Angel at the ushering out of an old landmark in Clearwater F.L. (The Spyglass Hotel)


The Spyglass like many buildings of their time has run their course of desirability.

Many of us may have great memories of old buildings and even great companies that delivered exceptional service. Where has it gone?
In the Electronic distribution business companies such as: Schweber, Hamillton, Hallmark, Kent Wiley, Milgray, and ACI to name a few have been gobbled up in the name of progress. So now we have only the big cookie cutter companies that offer only what they decide.
Some would say “gone are the days you got your windshield cleaned and were asked “May I Check Your Oil” when you pulled into your local service station. (We now call them gas stations)
Electronic Supply Chain Solutions aka ESCS is one company that still believes that a knowledgeable staff, a quality management system and a sense of urgency are still needed in the mil spec world of change.
ESCS provides web products designed to deliver precise information faster and even better than Google. Surfing the web with search engines provides a general selection of information.
ESCS believes in providing the exact required information for buyers to make sound business decisions. Visit ESCS9120.com We don’t do windows but we will do more than just check you oil!

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

How not to Shave Aerospace Quality to the Bone on Electronic Components .... WhyThink AS9120 Certified?

If you ever decided to go out for a quality meal, you first pick a restaurant that has been described by others as having great food and service. Each of those two ingredients was well planned and executed which resulted in a positive experience. Sometimes you feel like a great meal sometimes you don’t. We often try to eat healthy but are willing to throw caution to the wind in the heat of convenience or hast. Well let’s say you always want a good meal but aren’t willing to pay for it. After all at the end of the day it’s just another meal. So what does this have to do with Aerospace electronics? Well nothing unless the poor standards practiced by the Chinese companies that were ISO 9001 certified are now killing our pets and contaminating the food chain that humans are consuming.

We have not begun to count human lives lost. We all learned about aerospace components and what kind of o-rings NASA had used on the Challenger. The loss of life and the ramifications it had to the future of space travel are more than just a bad dining experience. Most of us have been on a jet. There are procedures and routine preventative maintenance that is planned and executed to provide you a safe and positive experience. ESCS understands mil spec
A bad airline experience quickly and publicly takes human lives. It is not forgotten like a bad meal. The lesson learned is improved procedures as well as proactive measurement of all products and suppliers can safeguard that history does not repeat it self. The definition of isanity is "to repeat the same action over and over and expect a different result."

The Aerospace industry by its nature has to hold itself to a higher standard!
For years many factories have embraced the idea of quality with ISO 9001 however this quality management system falls short of the requirements needed to protect human life.
The Aerospace industry created an AS9100 standard for manufacturers, AS9120 for distributors, and AS9110 for repair and over haul facilities. This standard was built on the foundation of the International Standards Organization ISO9001 however over 100 added requirements are demanded by the Aerospace AS9100 standard to ensure a safe and positive experience.

The AS9120 standard mandates that you identify an approved supplier data base.
1.) You must identify the scope of what you buy.
2.) You must keep a matrix on the number of orders, how many on-time deliveries and how many quality issues for each supplier.
3.) All lot codes are documented. Any split lot codes must be documented for 7 years.
AS9100 requires not only that you check what you are doing but that you are proactively measuring the practices and procedures you follow will achieve an improved predicted goal.

In contrast ISO9001 certified companies are not required to measure their suppliers the same way, nor are they required to keep track of date codes or a split lot of material.
Wouldn’t you like to know that the aerospace companies and the companies that support them are mandated to identify quality companies who perform, keep track of how old those o-rings were and what other companies they were sent to! If the companies were not AS9100 certified, we may never know! Buying because it is cheap or purchasing from a supplier who buys surplus lots that are not required to have any quality control systems in place is no longer an option! Some resellers go so far as to state they are ISO9001 compliant. According to whom! Buying a box of documents and crossing out the word company and replacing it with your company name some could say makes you compliant but only to the one who sold you the make believe quality system.
You don’t buy a certification. It’s like a college diploma, you learn it, earn it, and practice it, prefect it and it becomes part of who you are. Being compliant is like a high school student saying I have read some of the books Wharton school of Business graduates have used in their education.
DO PLAN CHECK is the Aerospace "credo"
Which of the 3C’s should represent your current supplier’s quality management system?
Complacent, Compliant, or Certified
What subjective evidence have you demanded of your suppliers that demonstrate they will provide a Q.M.S that is protecting your supply chain to combat counterfeits?
Want to learn how not to Shave Aerospace Quality on Electronic components?
Visit www.combatcounterfeits.com/ or www.escs9120.com/ to learn more!