Dynamic Defect Detection – Part II Implementation
In the amount of time it takes the average reader to read this article, more than a million bearings will have been manufactured for inclusion in more than 2000 components that will be integrated by tier-one suppliers into more than 1200 different products.
Consider a manufacturer of alternators as a tier one component supplier to an automaker. A bearing manufacturer produces ball bearings at tier two or tier three and incorporates them into a bearing assembly to sell to the alternator manufacturer. The bearing is assembled on a shaft, the primary structural element of the rotor assembly, which is then assembled with housing, including field windings and various electrical parts to complete the alternator component. These components will be produced at a rate from several hundred to two thousand per day. The tier-one supplier understands that life or death as a business depends on delivering alternators free of defects.