Product Advice
Test Fail? Who Do You Blame?
You can test the possible causes of a failure until you pinpoint the true reason for the failure.
An article in the Learning Center at cirris.com talks about how to improve quality by focusing on “First Pass Yield.” This means finding out what percentage of cables in your facility pass when tested. This also includes learning how many cables failed and were scrapped or required rework. While it’s easier to focus on the success of good, well-built cables, studying failures can help yield a higher percentage of good cables.
In establishing a quality system, designate studying failures as a key step in increasing the number of good cables. When describing this step, the cirris.com article says, “In some ways defective assemblies can be more valuable than a good assembly.” Failed cables give you an opportunity to improve quality because you can determine why the error occurred and learn how to fix it.
When looking at bad cables, ask yourself,
- What error caused the cable to fail?
- At what point in the build process did this error occur?
- How often does this error occur?
- What can we change to stop this error occurring again?
Studying failures can be one of the most valuable ways to increase the number of good cables your company produces. For more information on this subject, see the First Pass Yield series of articles at cirris.com.
Further Reading:
What to Do if Your Cable Isn’t Passing