Material Specification

Purpose

In the Quality Management (QM) component, you can inspect either based on an inspection plan, or (with certain limitations) based on material specifications that are valid on a company-wide basis.

In such an inspection, the specifications from the material specification are used as the inspection specifications. In contrast to the inspection plan, the material specification is a specification that you can use for all plants, that is easier to maintain, and that can replace or supplement a plant-specific inspection plan.

Integration

Depending on the settings in Customizing , you define which class characteristics are to be valuated with the results of the inspection, by assigning master inspection characteristics to class characteristics In addition, this allows you to use the intervals that have been defined in the batch classification as inspection specifications.

When an inspection lot is created, the system copies the master inspection characteristics from the inspection plan and material specification into the inspection lot. The inspection specifications from the material specification take precedence over the inspection specifications in the inspection plan.

Features

In the material specification, you can assign master inspection characteristics to a material.
You can define special inspection specifications for the material for each master inspection characteristic contained in the material specification.
When you use a referenced master inspection characteristic that is not assigned to a class characteristic, you can unlock the master inspection characteristic, change the inspection specifications for a material individually and store them in the material specification. If there is an assignment to a class characteristic, you make this change in the batch class of the material.
A material specification enables simplified inspection planning at client level.
When you inspect with a material specification, inspection results can be transferred automatically to batches and the class characteristics from the batch class can be valuated automatically at inspection completion, provided that the material is to be handled in batches.
In an inspection with a material specification, the inspection specifications from the batch determination take precedence over the inspection specifications in the master inspection characteristic, if the master inspection characteristic is assigned to the class characteristic.
In an inspection with a material specification, the inspection specifications from the variant configuration take precedence over the inspection specifications in the master inspection characteristic, if the master inspection characteristic is assigned to the class characteristic.

Constraints

Note the following when you use a material specification in an inspection:

You cannot predefine work centers

Note Note

To download data using the IDI , you must always use a work center. However, since you cannot predefine work centers in the material specification, but the inspection specifications are defined in the material specification, you must proceed as follows:

End of the note.

You create a material specification with master inspection characteristics.
You create a dummy inspection plan that only contains one operation with one work center.
In the inspection setup (Quality Management view of the material master), set the indicators Insp. with task list and Insp. with mat spec.

You cannot dynamically modify the inspection scope.
You cannot use all characteristic types.
You must completely maintain master inspection characteristics (reference characteristic or complete copy model).