Signature analysis system: new technology to enhance quality in manufacturing

The demands for ever improving quality coupled with requests for constant cost reductions have never been as great as they are today. Technology has a major role to play in terms of providing improved measurement instrumentation and process control systems to enable today's manufacturers to supply tomorrow's improved products. Signature analysis, although used extensively in the R&D laboratories for many years now, is relatively new at the shopfloor level in manufacturing and assembly facilities as these systems tended to be quite expensive and not sufficiently easy to use. This article introduces the latest advances in signature analysis, specifically for the demanding environments of the assembly plant, and makes reference to real-world applications.