In the second video of our Metrology Training Lab series, we continue our calibration training and address the following questions.
1. What does calibration mean?
2. What is the real purpose of calibration?
3. What makes a bunch of measurements an official calibration?
Different organizations and different industries have various quality standards and rules on how to calibrate and how to analyze a measurement process.
First you need to determine if that out of tolerance condition has been impacting your product quality. What does this gage being out of tolerance today mean for the measurements you were just making yesterday, or a week ago, or a month ago.
Second, if the gage is out of tolerance, maybe your calibration interval needs to be adjusted to prevent that from happening again. Calibration intervals should be based on the historical performance of the measuring instrument – and the as-found calibration results are the key data used to lengthen or shorten calibration intervals.
Third, if the gage is out of tolerance, what can be done to fix that? For some equipment, like this micrometer, a good cleaning is often enough to bring it back within tolerance. After the as-found data is collected, it is typical in calibration to then clean and perform any recommended preventative maintenance. After that is done, in some digital equipment, like this linear height, there is a maintenance mode that authorized technicians can access that provide for corrections or adjustments to be made to the accuracy of the instrument. And in some cases, cleaning, maintenance, and adjustments are not enough and then repair is required.