[BC] FM10K

[James B. Potter]

Robertm:  

Roger that.  In the case you cite, that factory's position descriptions and
department mission for ME vary from the usual standard (my experience) of
segregation of duties and responsibilities with design engineering. Anywhere
I worked, if ME wanted to vary a product design for 'manufacturability' then
it required a serious meeting with design engineering for a blessing,
otherwise it would have been treason.  ME was also responsible for shop
drawings, variations in the bills of material with purchasing, and written
assembly procedures. But design engineering controlled the BOM and was
always responsible for controlling and reducing product cost. Sometimes
parts procurement, e.g., doorknob capacitors, became long-leadtime or
expensive (potting compound comes to mind) so relief was requested to drop
or substitute the parts in question from the build if justifiable and
signed-off by a pyramid of responsible engineers including the Chief.  It
was generally understood that problems in the field caused by arbitrary
circuit deletions come to bite you in the backside bigtime.  

I've seen big heads roll over some of this stuff, particularly if the VP
Engineering and VP Manufacturing don't get along well personally. That turns
into war. 

Regards/J 

>Well at least one very well known broadcast transmitter manufacturer has
that issue with manufacturing engineering and has had it for decades. Worse,
the schematics were not always updated to match the changes. One very well
known design engineer complained about it often.