APQP Training, Advanced Product Quality Planning
APQP training, advanced product quality planning training course covers the tools and procedures required for the quality protocols designed to ensure a product meets standards and it satisfies the customer.
APQP is a quality configuration applied mainly to develop new products in the automotive industry. However, it can be used in all industries and is similar to the notion of design for six sigma. The APQP process is presented in AIAG manual.
APQP Concentrates on:
- Up-front quality planning
- Analyzing the findings to identify whether (or not) customers are happy & support continual improvement
APQP Primary Phases:
- Plan and define the project
- Product design and development
- Process design and development
- Feedback, assessment, and corrective actions
- Control plan
APQP Major Activities:
- Planning
- Product Design and Development
- Process Design and Development
- Product and Process Validation
- Production
Inputs and Outputs of the APQP Process
- Planning
Inputs
- Voice of the customer
- Business plan/marketing strategies
- Product/process benchmark data
- Product/process assumptions
- Product reliability studies
- Customer inputs
Outputs
- Design goals
- Quality/reliability goals
- Introductory bill of material
- Introductory list of special product and process specifications
- Product assurance plan
- Management support
- Product Design and Development
Input
- Design goals
- Quality/reliability goals
- Introductory bill of material
- Introductory list of special product and process specifications
- Product assurance plan
- Management support
Output
- DFMEA
- Design for manufacturing and assembly
- Design verification
- Design reviews
- Prototype build- Control plan
- Engineering drawings
- Engineering specifications
- Material specifications
- Drawing and specifications changing
- New equipment, tooling, and facilities requirements
- Special products and process features
- Measuring/ testing instrument requirements
- Team feasibility commitment and management support
- Process Design and Development
Input
- DFMEA
- Design for manufacturing and assembly
- Design verification
- Design reviews
- Prototype build- Control plan
- Engineering drawings
- Engineering specifications
- Material specifications
- Drawing and specifications changing
- New equipment, tooling, and facilities requirements
- Special products and process features
- Measuring/ testing instrument requirements
- Team feasibility commitment and management support
Output
- Packaging standards
- Product/process quality system reviews
- Process flow chart
- Characteristics matrix
- PFMEA
- Pre-launch control plan
- Process instructions
- Measurement systems analysis plan
- Preliminary process capability study plan
- Packaging specifications
- Management support
- Products and Process Validation
Input
- Packaging standards
- Product/process quality system reviews
- Process flow chart
- Characteristics matrix
- PFMEA
- Pre-launch control plan
- Process instructions
- Measurement systems analysis plan
- Preliminary process capability study plan
- Packaging specifications
- Management support
Output
- Production trial run
- Measurement systems analysis
- Preliminary process capability study
- Production part approval
- Production validation testing
- Packaging analysis
- Production control plan
- Quality planning sign-off and management support
- Feedback, Assessment, and Corrective Actions
Input
- Production trial run
- Measurement systems analysis
- Preliminary process capability study
- Production part approval
- Production validation testing
- Packaging analysis
- Production control plan
- Quality planning sign-off and management support
Output
- Reduced variation
- Customer satisfaction
- Delivery and service
The APQP Process Main Components
- Understanding customer’s needs.
- By using “voice of the customer techniques” to identify customer’s demands and applying quality function methods and convert them into product features/specifications
- Proactive feedback & corrective action.
- The superior quality process offers feedback from other similar projects with the goal of deriving counter-measures on the existing project. Other mechanisms with verification and validation, design reviews, analysis of customer feedback and warranty data also serves this goal.
- Design within process capabilities
- This objective requires the company to bring its processes under statistical control, identify its process capability and present the identified capabilities to its development personnel. Then, development personnel should officially identify the special specifications within the enterprise’s process capability or invent action to enhance the process or attain more capable equipment.
- Analyze & mitigate failure modes
- By applying methods such as FMEA
- Verification & validation
- Design verification is to ensure that the design findings meet design input specifications. Design verification can contain actions such as: design reviews, performing alternate calculations, understanding tests and demonstrations, and review of design documents before release.
- Validation is to assure that the product meets the defined user needs, requirements, and/or specifications under given operating conditions. Design validation is performed on the final product design with parts that meet design intent. Production validation is performed on the final product design with parts that meet design intent produced production processes intended for normal production.
- Design reviews
- Design reviews are official reviews performed over the development of a product to ensure that the specifications, notion, product or process satisfies the requirements of that stage of development, the issues are considered and understood, the risks are taken into consideration, and there is a good business case for development. General design reviews include: requirements review, concept/preliminary design review, final design review, and a production readiness/launch review.
- Control special/critical characteristics
- Defined through quality development implementation, or other similar systematic method. Once these characteristics are known, and there is an analysis that the process is able to conform to these characteristics, the process must be controlled. A control plan should be developed to specify how this is accomplished. Control Plans offers a written explanation of systems applied in reducing product and process variation including equipment, equipment set-up, processing, tooling, fixtures, material, preventative maintenance and methods.
What are the Advantages of APQP?
- Higher qualified
- Improved communication
- Reduced costs
Why Do You Need to Employ APQP?
APQP enables a clear communication between the supplier and the customer to elucidate specifications that later can be transformed into more detailed requirements. Some of the cases of APQP in action:
- Product design actions interacting some certain characteristics to the process design activity, before the design is final, connecting the DFMEA to PFMEA.
- Plan, attain, and implement suitable process equipment and tooling according to design tolerances requested by the customer. – CPPD (Collaborative Product Process Design)
- Assembly personnel sharing suggestions on more effective ways to make a product before completion of the design of the product. – DFA/M (Design for Assembly and Manufacturing)
- Production or Process Engineering founding sufficient Quality Controls for descriptions of a product or elements of a process, which still risk potential failure. – Control Plan Methodology
- Conducting Stability and Capability investigations on special features to realize the differences existing and predict future performance. – SPC (Statistical Process Control and Process Capability)
How Can You Learn More About APQP?
You can find more details about this training course HERE.