Standards, Volume 3, Issue 1 (March 2023) – 8 articles

A systematic approach to nonconformity management and continuous improvements are the key elements of the quality management system. The objective of this paper is to present quality improvement for a manufacturing company producing forgings through the combination of several statistical methods and quality control techniques. First, Pareto analysis was applied, followed by the 8D (eight disciplines) methodology using a structured eight-step approach to problem solving following the PDCA (plan-do-check-act) method. The aim was to identify the problem and discover the critical causes of failures in the management system that allowed the problem to occur, by modifying and combining appropriate quality management methods and tools. The paper introduces a case study considering the forging process in the production of gearboxes, where customer complaints were identified in the last year, demanding the need to eliminate failures. Using the mentioned methods, the root cause of the problem was identified and permanent corrective action was planned and implemented according to the recommendations of the 8D report, which made it possible to reduce the likelihood of a recurrence of this problem and increase customer satisfaction. Full article

Advanced air mobility (AAM) is a sustainable aviation initiative to deliver cargo and passengers in urban and regional locations by electrified drones. The widespread expectation is that AAM adoption worldwide will help to reduce pollution, reduce transport costs, increase accessibility, and enable a more reliable and resilient supply chain. However, most countries lack regulations that legalize AAM. A fragmented regulatory approach hampers the progress of business prospectors and international organizations concerned with human welfare. Therefore, amidst high uncertainty, knowledge of indicators that can predict the propensity for AAM adoption will help nations and organizations plan for drone use. This research finds predictive indicators by assembling a unique dataset of 36 economic, social, environmental, governance, land use, technology, and transportation indicators for 204 nations. Subsequently, the best of 12 different machine learning models ranks the predictive importance of the indicators. The gross domestic product (GDP) and the regulatory quality index (RQI) developed by the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) project were the two top predictors. Just as importantly, the poor predictors were as follows: the social progress index developed by the Social Progress Imperative, the WGI rule-of-law index, land use characteristics such as rural and urban proportions, borders on open waterways, population density, technology accessibility such as electricity and cell phones, carbon dioxide emission level, aviation traffic, port traffic, tourist arrivals, and roadway fatalities. Full article

Organizations and laboratories tend to integrate systems based on risk management. Risk management helps to optimize laboratory processes and information flow, increase valid and reliable results, and make better decisions. This paper describes the development and present trends in risk management related to standard ISO/IEC 17025. This paper focuses on risk assessment in the accredited testing laboratories using the FMEA tool. In the basic eight defined laboratory areas, risks were identified and evaluated, and methods were proposed to minimize them. Full article

Approximately one-third of the food produced globally—close to 1 billion tons—ends up as waste, and, at the same time, more than 800 million people are undernourished, which makes Sustainable Development Goal 12.3, to halve food waste by 2020, rather ambitious if not illusory. In the present study, data on food waste in households, the food service sector, and the retail sector are used as indicators for 78 countries that are analyzed by applying a partial order methodology—allowing all indicators to be taken into account simultaneously—to disclose the “good” (below average) and the “bad” (above average) among the countries on an average scale. Countries such as Belgium, Japan, and Slovenia should be labeled as “good” in this context, whereas the “bad” includes countries such as Nigeria, Rwanda, and Tanzania, countries that must cope simultaneously with severe malnutrition and hunger. This study further includes a search for so-called peculiar countries. Here, the USA and Ireland pop up, as they have very high amounts of waste in their food service sectors due to their eating profiles. Finally, the possible influence of assigning a higher weight to household waste is discussed. The overall objective of this study is to contribute to the necessary decisions that need to be made in order to fight the food waste problem and, thus, fulfill Sustainable Development Goal No. 2—zero hunger. As the world produces enough food for everyone, it is unacceptable that more than 800 million people are undernourished and that 14 million children suffer from stunting; perhaps all countries call for the label “ugly”. The present study contributes to highlighting the food waste problem and suggests specific action points for the studied countries. Full article

This study presents an approach to structure, analyze and evaluate corporate standardization processes using the example of pre-standardization for the reduction of environmental impacts in product design and development. For this purpose, we give a detailed description of the evolution of the European Standard EN 16524 entitled “Mechanical products—Methodology for reduction of environmental impacts in product design and development”. The standardization strategy behind the evolution of EN 16524 is analyzed using the approach of a Business Model Canvas combined with an evaluation using pre-defined success factors. Moreover, we derive general recommendations for corporate standardization professionals in checklists for each field of the underlying Business Model Canvas. With regard to the case study depicted here, we come to the conclusion that pre-standards are especially suited for innovation transfer in the field of emerging and rapidly evolving scientific and technical results. Full article

This paper proposes a workflow so that engineering scholars can learn to ask effective questions to establish systems of consultation to workers following the indications of the international standard ISO 45001 “Occupational health and safety management systems” (Chapter 5.1) in the context of a medium-size developer and construction company. The methodology has been specifically designed to assess whether it is possible for students to acquire skills in ISO 45001 by developing an innovative method for their own employee questionnaires, and this new standard requires professionals who know how to apply the fundamentals in an industrial context. An experiment with 31 mechanical engineering students was carried out. The new methodology was applied based on three learning levels: large group, working group, and individual student. Different research instruments have been applied to evaluate how they perceive the activity with respect to the usefulness for learning and adaptation to reality. It has also tried to evaluate the subjective sensation during the development of the activity: feelings of happiness, self-confidence, and satisfaction of the scholars. The results show that students considered the activity as interesting, useful for learning, and adapted to reality, posing an important challenge that may have served to improve intrinsic motivation in the learning of management systems. Full article

The Internet of Things (IoT) and smart manufacturing (SM) are mutually reinforcing. The establishment of IoT-based common facilities for SM is the premise of building SM system. Industrial IoT (IIoT) infrastructure for SM refers to common facilities based on IoT that support SM in industries or sectors, and plays a dominant role and faces severe challenges in the intelligence of SM. The infrastructure is independent of the products and production process in a specific factory. This paper develops conceptual and capability frameworks of IIoT infrastructure from a unified perspective of IIoT-related SM industries. These frameworks reflect relationships between IIoT and SM with in-depth relationships among basic facilities of IIoT infrastructure and lay the foundation of SM. In this paper the common characteristics and high-level requirements with respect to the different IoT layers of IIoT infrastructure are analyzed, and the capability framework and relevant capabilities of IIoT infrastructure are summarized according to the characteristics and requirements. In order to help service providers implement their systems to meet the needs of SM, the existing and newly developed IIoT infrastructure are integrated partially or in whole according to the intelligence level, so as to provide technical guidance for stakeholders to apply emerging ICTs to SM. Full article