ABSTRACT
Standardization improves quality because procurement will have the time and focus to search for the best quality parts and qualify them before they can be specified. This chapter presents a powerful, yet easy-to-implement standardization procedure, which can reap enough benefits to be well worth the effort as a stand-alone program. Part standardization presents the greatest opportunities for new designs or redesigns. The chapter presents examples of part type listing orders: cleaning up part and material databases, eliminating approved but unused parts, eliminating parts not used recently, and eliminating duplicate parts. The zero-based approach determines the minimum list of parts needed for new designs and is not intended to eliminate parts used on existing products, except when the standard parts are functionally equivalent in all respects. If raw materials can be standardized, then processes can be flexible enough to make different products without any setup to change materials, fixturing mechanisms, or cutting tools.
