Dell PCBA QPA Rev4.2
PCBA Quality Process Audit
Information and Instructions
Rev. 4.2 PURPOSE
This document was developed as an Audit Tool to assess PCBA Manufacturing Process Capability.
It is intended to provide an assessment of PCBA Manufacturing Capability based on PCBA Manufacturing Complexity.
Less complex PCBA's will not require the same manufacturing capability as more complex PCBA's.
Thus by matching capability with complexity, the most economic manufacturing solution can be determined for a sustained quality performance. The tool may also be used to assess RMA/Repair Capability.
A qualified auditor may also use this tool as a guideline to conduct a process 'Gap Analysis' based on product complexity.
The Lead Free section of this Audit Tool may be used to audit a suppliers compliance with Dell's "Lead Free Supplier Assessment Survey" and readiness to produce Lead Free product.
SCOPE
The PCBA Audit Document is primarily intended to be used for suppliers/manufacturers of PCBA Products for Dell.
The audit document may also be used to assess the manufacturing process for any PCBA that is incorporated into a Dell assembly.
When used to assess RMA/Repair Capability, the tool may be used at any location where RMA/Repair activity takes place.
The Lead Free section of this Audit Tool is intended to assess the Lead Free process and product readiness for any supplier whose process or pro includes the production or repair of solder joints. This section of the Audit Tool also applies to any supplier whose process or product uses solder fo mechanical joining of parts.
PCBA COMPLEXITY and CAPABILITY MATCHING
The SQE Auditor will decide what PCBA Complexity category to audit a supplier facility or potential supplier facility against.
This determination is made based on the complexity of the PCBA product to be outsourced or evaluated
To do this, the complexity of the product must first be calculated using Dell Tool COR.40.WWP.SQ.0229. This is available on Value Chain, Doc Va Root, PCBA SQE Tool Kit.
Knowing the product complexity, it is then possible to use this tool to make an assessment of the line installed for a product of that complexity. There are 10 categories of complexity used by Dell, ranging from 1 (Most Complex) to 10 (Least Complex).
In this audit, complexity categories are grouped into five categories as can be seen on the individual audit worksheets.
Lead Free Commodity Complexity Matrix
The Lead Free section of this Audit Tool is divided into 3 commodity complexity categories. The complexity level used for this audit will be determine by the Dell Commodity team and the Dell SQE.
Category 3 is the highest complexity. This category will include Motherboards assemblies and OEM / ODM manufacturers. Any supplier audited in category will be required to complete the lead free section of this Audit Tool, the Supplier Lead Free Assessment Survey, a product level qualific
L3 Reliability testing as defined in Dell specification D4559, and participate in a Lead Free section of their QBR.
Category 2 is for medium to complex PCBA's. Suppliers with product in this category will be required to complete the lead free section of this Audi Supplier Lead Free Assessment Survey, a product level qualification, L2 or L3 Reliability testing as defined in Dell specification D4559,
and participate in a Lead Free section of their QBR.
Audit requirements are the same for Category 3 and Category 2.
Category 1 is for low complexity PCBA's such as control panels, risers, etc. Suppliers with product in this category will be required to complete the section of this Audit Tool, and the Supplier Lead Free Assessment Survey. Qualification may be per Level 1 requirements as defined in Dell spe
D4559 or by certificate of compliance, as defined by the Dell Commodity team. If the supplier participates in the QBR process, a Lead Free section added to the QBR score card.
AUDIT BY SELF ASSESSMENT
A supplier's facility is required to complete a self assessment using this tool in advance of the Dell Audit.
By doing this the facility will be able to prepare for the audit and seek advance help and guidance from Dell SQE to be best positioned to succeed. It is expected that during the self-assessment process, that the supplier will use this opportunity to ask questions for either clarification or to
better understand intent of the audit criteria. Waiting for the formal Dell audit to ask these types of questions is too late. It is also expected
that based on self audit results, a supplier will inform the Dell team of their readiness for a formal Dell audit.
A self assessment is completed by adding a score to the relevant column in each worksheet once product complexity has been determined.
If a facility has multiple lines building Dell product of the same complexity, the supplier shall ensure all lines are available to be audited.
The SQE Auditor will randomly select one line to be audited for the product complexity to be assessed.
During the audit process, the Dell SQE may wish to review every question/criterion listed on the audit document, or alternatively the SQE may choos to focus only on those questions for which the supplier awarded themselves a score of 1 by self-assessment. The path taken is left to SQE discretio The score awarded by the SQE Auditor will be entered in the 'Actual' column on each worksheet.
In this way the delta between the self assessment and the actual score is known. The size of this delta is a measure of audit preparedness
and understanding. The difference between "self score" and "actual score" will be approximately 5% if preparation and understanding is
The Lead Free self audit information should come from the suppliers "Lead Free Self Assessment" survey input.
AUDIT RESULTS
The SQE Auditor must complete at least 7 of the 14 processes before an Audit Result can be declared.
It is strongly recommended that all 14 sections of the audit be completed for suppliers who have no previous experience with manufacturing
PCBA's for Dell or for existing Dell suppliers who are attempting to build a higher complexity PCBA product for the first time.
The Lead Free section is mandatory for any audit score.
The overall process average result determines the Audit score achieved for the PCBA Supplier assessed.
The 'Pass' score for the Audit is 80% for all PCBA Products irrespective of complexity.
If an overall process average score of equal or greater than 80% is achieved, and no individual processes have failed, a 'Pass' result is awarded.
If one or more individual processes have failed, but an overall Audit score of equal or greater than 80% was achieved, either a "Conditional Pass" or a "Fail" Result shall be awarded. The determination of this audit result is at the discretion of the Lead SQE Auditor, based on the
severity of the issues for any of the failing sections.
If the overall process average score is less than 80%, a "Fail" result is awarded.
NOTE: An individual process fails when the section score is below 80% OR if an "non-negotiable" question scores 0. (see "Audit
Mechanics" instructions for additional information.)
If the "Lead Free" section fails, an overall fail result is awarded.
If the supplier does not receive a passing score on the Lead Free section, then they may not ship Lead Free product to Dell. The supplier
action items associated with the Lead Free section and receive a passing score before shipping Lead Free product to Dell.
If a "Conditional Pass" or "Fail" Result is awarded, a Corrective Action Plan is due from the supplier within two weeks of the date of audit
The Corrective Action Plan must contain a timeline to 'bridge' to a Pass status and must propose a target date for a Dell follow-up Audit.
Failure to achieve a Pass Result on the follow up Audit may impact business award decisions.
A PASS RESULT
Once a supplier's facility has passed the Audit for a particular product complexity, the facility's process is approved for all products of that complexity Thus, the facility has proven their capability to build a product of that complexity for the line audited. As long as the same process capability
is deployed for any new lines, there is no need to do 'official' audits for any additional lines added for product of that complexity.
NOTE: While it is not an 'official' requirement to use the audit tool for additional lines, it is strongly advised that the SQE utilize the audit tool
to verify that the capability of any new line is matched to the existing capability of the existing lines for a given PCBA complexity.
NOTE: For the purpose of "proven capability to build a product", a "facility" is defined as the same physical building, AND the same product complexity, AND the same supplier production and quality management team resources.
If a facility is approved for the most complex PCBA product, this does NOT necessarily mean they are automatically approved for all less
complex products at that facility. Regardless of product complexity level, any test processes related to a new product should be audited
because test processes are unique, based on product type, not PCBA process complexity.
An Audit will need to be conducted to ensure the capability deployed at least meets the minimum requirements for the less complex
A suppliers facility must pass the Lead Free section of the audit before they will be allowed to ship Lead Free product to Dell. A minimum
obtained to pass the Lead Free section.
AUDIT MECHANICS and QUESTIONS
The Audit breaks down the PCBA Manufacturing Process into individual process steps, each of which is represented by an individual worksheet. Within each worksheet is contained a series of questions specifically pertaining to the process being examined.
These questions are focused on evaluating Process Disciplines, Control Methods, Process Capability/Technology, and Attention to Detail. The questions were devised and developed as closed questions with every attempt to avoid ambiguity.
Because of the closed nature of the questions, there can only be one of two answers to any question, i.e. Yes (1) or No (0).
Thus, the criterion is either fully met or it is not. If the Criterion is met, a score of 1 is obtained. If the Criterion is not met, a score of 0 is obtained.
If there is any doubt as to the score to award for any given Criterion, a score of zero shall be awarded by default.
Any Criterion that scores 1 shall be clearly demonstrated, followed, and be beyond reproach.
In the event that a supplier clearly meets the intent of the audit question, but does not exactly do what the question asks, a score of 1 shall be give There are cells within the audit document that are shaded in gray. These cells may be coded as Not Applicable (NA) under certain conditions.
If coded NA, the denominator in the score percentage calculation will automatically be adjusted to account for this NA allocation to the cell.
The conditions under which NA may be allocated are as follows:-
1. NA may be allocated to a cell if the question is not applicable to the product due to some 'real' physical reason.
For example, if there are no MSD devices are on a product, then the questions pertaining to MSD's would be coded NA.
2. NA may be allocated to a cell if the question is not applicable to the product because the physical product does not undergo a specific process. For example, if there are no press fit connectors on a product, then the questions pertaining to the press fit process may be coded NA.
3. NA may be allocated to a cell if by answering some questions 'yes', other questions become redundant or irrelevant.
For example, if AOI is deployed, then the questions pertaining to Manual Inspection may be scored NA
Note 1: Not all gray shaded questions will be coded NA. The NA status is conditional on the above and SQE discretion.
Note 2: Gray shaded cells are applicable when the process is deployed, and may still score zero if the above conditions are not satisfied.
For example, AOI is not required for complexity 5 PCBA's, but it may be deployed based on supplier preference
If AOI is deployed, AOI questions must be scored 1 or 0, not NA.
Note 3: No other questions, other than those that have been predetermined by the gray shading, can be considered to be NA.
There are certain questions in each section, (shaded in blue), that are considered non negotiable (NN). In other words the question must score a 1. If any of these questions score a 0, then the process section under review will automatically fail (NN Fail), regardless of overall score.
For example, if the overall result for a section is equal to or greater than 80% and if any one of the "non negotiable" questions scored a
zero, then the overall result for that section will be Fail, irrespective of the overall score.
AUDITING A NEW SUPPLIER OR A NEW SUPPLIER FACILITY
If a potential supplier or new supplier facility is required to be audited then the category to be completed in the audit document shall
appropriately reflect the complexity of the product to be manufactured.
However, since such a supplier/facility will not be manufacturing a Dell product the SQE Auditor will have to select a line with a product which
most closely matches the product to be manufactured and which is representative of the production line that the supplier intends to use to build Del The SQE will not consider auditing a 'virtual' line based on some future installed capability.
The Lead Free section is required to be audited for all new suppliers for facilities.
AUDITING FOR RMA/REPAIR
This tool may also be used to assess capability of RMA/Repair facilities.
All process highlighted on the Menu page are relevant for when it is necessary to conduct a Manufacturing Process QPA
However, only those menu buttons highlighted in 'blue' an applicable sections of the Lead Free section (3.8 - 3.14, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9) may be used
for a Repair/RMA QPA Audit.
TRAINING
The PCBA Process Audit is very technical in content.
SQE's who use this tool are considered within Dell as being sufficiently qualified to conduct this audit.
To obtain this qualification, an SQE will have participated in at least three audits and lead a fourth under the supervision of a qualified auditor.
SQE's wishing to use this tool should contact their regional champion to arrange for training, qualification and certification.
SQE's should receive training on Dell's Lead Free implementation strategy before conducting the Lead Free audit.
AUDIT SCHEDULE
The Audit may be used as and when the need arises. However, Dell will conduct an official audit at least annually for key suppliers. Before conductin an audit, the auditor must ensure the Dell commodity management team responsible for the relationship are advised of the audit schedule.
It is also intended for suppliers to conduct internal audits by self assessment every quarter so progress may be reported to Dell.
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
Please contact Henry Zhang at henry_zhang@https://www.wendangku.net/doc/cc18330200.html, for additional information or if there are any specific questions with regard to the technical c Please contact Wallace Ables at wallace_ables@https://www.wendangku.net/doc/cc18330200.html, for additional information on the Lead Free section of the score card or to provide comme corrections.
REVISION HISTORY
A00 Initial Release. Oct 1996 (EMF Controlled Document). Authored by William Ryan
A01 Minor corrections. Dec 1996. (EMF Controlled Document). Changes by William Ryan
Rev 1.4 Addition of RMA and Test Update. Jan 1999. (Initial Release as a Corporate Document). Changes by Wallace Ables.
Rev 2.0 Extensive Review and Re-Write. July 2002. Authored by William Ryan.
Rev 3.0 Changes Listed Below. Authored by William Ryan.
Listed the non-negotiable items for PCBA Manufacturing.
Added details and rules to the instruction sheet for clarity.
Edited approximately 50% questions to increase clarity.
Removed hard NAs and placed rules in place for the use of NA.
Removed requirement for self-calibrating soldering irons,
Added rules on how may sections to be audited before a result can be declared.
Remove AOI requirements for Desktops.
Removed any inference to specific machinery/equipment manufacturers.
Changed PCBA categories to align with the Complexity Model.
Added MSD requirements to meet latest JEDEC standard.
Rev 4.0 Added the Lead Free audit section. Authored by Wallace Ables
Added instructions for the Lead Free audit
Rev 4.1 Corrected errors in formulas on Lead Free section, and added the Lead Free Repair section (Authored by Tin Man Wong)
Rev 4.2 Updated ownership of PCBA QPA document from Eric Hoe to Henry Zhang.