Challenges in practice
The standards-compliant management and safeguarding of test equipment is a key prerequisite for reliable measurement results and sound quality decisions. In practice, however, companies face the challenge of keeping a large number of different test instruments up-to-date, ready for use, and compliant with standards across various departments, locations, and applications.
Frequent retooling, changing locations, and new or modified testing requirements increase the organizational effort. Maintenance and calibration intervals must be monitored, shutdowns and repairs documented, and the use of test equipment managed transparently. Without a central system, transparency regarding the current status, usage history, or potential risks from unsuitable test equipment is often lacking.
In addition, customers and standards require proof that the test equipment used is suitable and that measurement results have been correctly secured – including traceability, documentation, and integration with testing and quality processes. Measurement system analysis (MSA) is an important component, but without systematic integration, it represents an additional organizational burden.
In addition to testing equipment, many companies also require regular inspection, maintenance, and documentation of machinery, systems, and other operating resources. These include production machines, maintenance objects, and safety equipment such as fire extinguishers or garage doors. Without a central system, these assets are often managed separately from the testing equipment, maintenance is tracked manually, and inspection intervals are not systematically monitored. This increases the risk of missed deadlines, missing documentation, and limited auditability.
Solution QS1
QS1 supports seamless, standards-compliant test equipment management and provides all relevant information centrally in one system. Test equipment is managed along with its specifications, areas of application, and condition, and is directly linked to test planning, incoming goods inspection, production inspections, and other quality assurance processes.
Maintenance, calibration, and testing intervals can be flexibly defined—based on time or usage—and are ensured through automatic reminders and status monitoring. The complete usage history of a test instrument, including issues, shutdowns, repairs, and test orders, is always traceable and documented in an audit-proof manner.
Thanks to this seamless traceability, deviations can be quickly identified to determine which products or tests are affected. QS1 thus increases process reliability and significantly reduces the risk of erroneous measurement results.
Measurement system analysis (MSA) is supported in QS1 by an integrated module and is closely linked to test equipment management, enabling suitability assessments to be carried out and documented in accordance with standards.
QS1 extends traditional test equipment management to include the management of machines, systems, and other objects requiring testing and maintenance. Individual testing, maintenance, and repair intervals can be defined for each object, its condition monitored, and all measures documented in an audit-proof manner.
This creates a unified system for all resources that require regular testing, maintenance, or release – from measuring instruments to machines and safety devices.
- Management of test equipment, machines, systems, and other objects (e.g., fire extinguishers, gates)
- Workflow-based control including to-dos, reminders, and escalations
- Maintenance monitoring with automatic notification
- Test equipment issuance and status management with integrated booking functions
- Audit-proof history tracking and traceability of all test equipment data
- Flexible testing, maintenance, and repair plans (time- or usage-based)
- Fully integrated connection to test planning
- Data exchange with external calibration and service providers
- Support for common norms and standards in the test equipment environment
- Integrated support for measurement system analysis (MSA) including pre-configured MSA and VDA methods as well as custom procedures
Does this sound familiar?
- Test equipment is "managed haphazardly," but in practice, reliability is lacking: Which equipment is operational, which is blocked, which is overdue, and which is with external calibration laboratories?
- Calibration and maintenance intervals are not properly implemented: Due dates are missed, returns are not consistently recorded, and during audits, the reliability of measurement data is suddenly called into question.
- MSA and VDA certifications are created sporadically but not maintained as an ongoing process: Capability monitoring, suitability assessments, and trend analyses are time-consuming and difficult to reproduce.
- Traceability breaks down where it matters most: Which test equipment produced which measurement, with which batch or serial number, with which configuration, and what was its status at the time of measurement?
- Data exchange with external service providers is fragmented: Test certificates, results, and status reports arrive via email or PDF and are not properly integrated into the process.
This should be achieved through a robust process
- Standards-compliant test equipment organization as a "single source of truth": Status, deployment, calibration/maintenance procedures, history, and documentation must be managed consistently and audit-proof.
- Due dates and operational readiness must be process-reliable: Intervals based on duration, fixed dates, or usage, as well as location- and deployment-specific rules, including automatic notification and blocking logic.
- MSA and VDA suitability certificates must be integrable and repeatable: Standard methods, freely definable parameters, trend and statistical functions, so that capability is not a one-off event.
- End-to-end traceability down to the measurement level: Test equipment <=> Measurement <=> Test order <=> Product/Batch/Serial number, so that root cause analyses remain reliable.
- External calibration laboratories must be integrated without loss of control: Defined workflow, clear status tracking, transparent feedback, and document storage.
Coverage in QS1
- Manages and monitors all test equipment types centrally or decentrally, including freely definable status, output management, and integrated booking functions.
- Controls calibration and maintenance regulations as well as any maintenance plans per test equipment, with intervals based on duration, fixed date, or performance, and location/application-specific rules.
- Reliably monitors due dates with automatic notification and traceable history tracking at all data levels.
- Supports standards-compliant measurement system analyses (MSAs) and VDA suitability assessments with preconfigured methods as well as custom procedures, including statistics and visualization functions.
- Integrates external calibration laboratories via workflows and ensures seamless data exchange, traceability, and reliable documentation, also in conjunction with test planning, measurement traceability, and SPC.
Your result: Audit-proof traceability of test equipment, reduced risk of systematic measurement errors, less coordination effort with internal and external bodies, reliable MSA/VDA certifications and robust measurement data as a basis for decisions.
Your advantages
- Centralized management of test equipment, machines, and other assets requiring monitoring
- High process reliability through standardized and consistent workflows
- Centralized transparency regarding the status, deployment, and history of all test equipment
- Audit-proof and revision-compliant documentation, including complete traceability
- Reduced risk of measurement errors through structured monitoring of maintenance, calibration, and deployment
- Decision-making support through up-to-date status information, evaluations, and analyses
- Full integration into test planning and control instead of isolated, stand-alone solutions
- Efficient collaboration through data exchange with external service providers
- Future-proof system through the integration of common norms and standards
- Integrated system for quality assurance and maintenance instead of parallel, stand-alone solutions
