Why is Seal and Gasket Material Traceability Important for the Automobile Industry?

Aug 30, 2016 Materials

Component traceability has become an important area in the automotive industry. It has helped either reduce many incidents of component failure, or product recall. Industrial seals and gaskets are among those products that come under scrutiny when it comes to product and material traceability. What exactly is seal or gasket material traceability? Why is this process important? Why should automobile companies have knowledge of all their seal and gasket suppliers? This post will provide the answers.

Understanding Seal and Gasket Material Traceability

In automobiles, seals and gaskets are designed to provide protection and reinforcement to power transmission assemblies, and other automotive systems involving high pressure levels. Just as the gaskets provide a form of physical reinforcement, traceability provides a virtual form of material reinforcement.

Documentation acts as a profile of each seal and gasket. It allows the automobile company to identify all the materials within a component. It also helps the company trace the material back to the original fabricator.

Automobile manufacturers are required to have knowledge of their seal suppliers, as well as the specifications of each sealing and gasket product. The seal suppliers need to have processes in place, which allows them to ensure complete product traceability.

How Important is Traceability?

Traceability is used for quality assurance, supplier/manufacturer relationships, and for product recalls. It provides an automobile manufacturer assurance that only high quality materials have been used in the production of the seals and gaskets. Ultimately, this leads to fewer vehicle manufacturing risks, reduced costs, and fewer instances of product failures. Thus, the more knowledge about a seal or gasket that a manufacturer has, the higher are the chances of ensuring customers of a quality product.

These are the reasons why automobile manufacturers consider gasket material traceability as extremely important. Traceability helps ensure high product quality, which results in less risks in automobile manufacturing and better performance when used by customers.