Inspection continues to grow

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No one can argue that the demographic of “test” strategies has continued to change for three decades. Test—once treated as the poor relation in a manufacturing operation—has taken on critical significance as a way to improve product quality and (to the surprise of many managers) reduce costs.

More recently, inspection has emerged as a legitimate component of most test strategies. When first implemented, inspection and “pure” test often resided in different parts of an organization, with inspection part of the manufacturing group. Conflicts arose. If test took over inspection duties, inspection staff members would lose their jobs.

Those concerns have receded. Today, inspection plays an increasingly critical role in the overall process. Certainly interest in the subject has exploded in recent years. Test & Measurement World initiated this test report as a semi-annual event. A few years ago we increased its frequency to quarterly. With this issue, we have officially gone bimonthly.

The principles of inspection haven’t changed since the job was performed by humans wielding magnifying lenses and microscopes. Some optical and x-ray systems still require constant human oversight. Some players in the industry have changed or merged, some of the early adopters remain, and new participants constantly add their own expertise to the mix.