F
2106 South Sylvanie Road
Lewis, Missouri
50607
Telephone: (816) 378-6183
Facsimile: (816) 984-1234
www.faraon.com
Dear Mr. Jones:
I am writing to you today to follow-up on our meeting this past April regarding Faraon’s
quality assurance concerns with the 12 Volt DC pump Messanie Engineering supplies for our
aerial units. Not every aerial unit manufactured includes a pump, but the ones that do have them
as a safety precaution for secondary stowage. In an ideal world, none of the installed pumps
would ever be utilized in the field, but as we have discussed before, this is not the case.
Starting in December of 2011, Faraon’s final assembly plants have seen an increasingly large
number of in-line and field rejections for this pump. Our post-rejection testing and analysis has
shown that over ninety percent of the rejections are due to moisture intrusion in the housing of
the pump or issues directly related to moisture intrusion. Faraon would like you to investigate
any manufacturing or assembly procedures that may have caused this sudden increase in
rejections. Shown below is an example of an in-line rejection, notice the amount of corrosion
present just three months after being installed.
Inside of motor cap.
View of the motor inside pump housing.
Messanie Engineering’s webpage states, “We’ll provide you with the right solution for your
specific requirements.” This being said, in 2006 the specifications for this pump were laid out
clearly with the Faraon end use application in mind. The principal idea being the pumps would
be exposed to the elements in numerous climates across the globe.
Depending on the aerial unit, the pumps are installed in a variety of orientations and locations.
At this time nearly eighty percent of all aerial units have pumps installed inside the pedestal
which helps deter some moisture intrusion. As seen during your visit, we manufacture one
aerial unit where pumps are installed outside the pedestal and are subject to all weather
elements.
Pumps housed inside the pedestal are installed vertically with the pump side up or down
depending on the hose routings for the particular unit. Due to the fact that these constraints exist
with the mounting orientation, space available and hose routings, we have researched possible
design changes that would eliminate moisture intrusion.
Faraon’s quality assurance team performed testing to verify specific intrusion points on the pump
unit. There are seven main areas, shown below, that are all susceptible to moisture intrusion.
Side view of pump showing
intrusion points 1-6.
Front/side view showing
intrusion point 7.
One option to consider is to have a sealed motor housing for the pump that would eliminate
intrusion points 2 and 5. The addition of an o-ring to areas 6 and 4 would prove beneficial.
For intrusion points 1, 3 and 7, a gasket material could be added to remove the possibility
of moisture intrusion. Our product development and quality assurance teams continue to
test random samples of your product from our stock to check for consistency in the issues
we are seeing. A test pad has also been set up for our personal testing of possible product
improvements. We will provide necessary updates as soon as they become available.
With each pump Faraon rejects, whether it is in-line or from the field, the $135 pump can cost up
to $600 in scrap, rework, and labor expenses. Currently we are rejecting just over two percent of
all pumps installed on aerial units; this is a sizable amount based on our estimated annual usage of
7,500 pumps. Based on these numbers our engineering team believes that, because the
specifications were clearly presented in our design proposal, Messanie Engineering should absorb
the excess cost associated with the upcoming design change and improvements. Messanie
Engineering’s mission statement touches on your standards for excellent quality and includes,
“This quality commitment doesn’t stop with engineering and manufacturing … post-production
testing procedures are structured to assure reliable performance and durability in the end use
application,” and as we have discussed, our end use application quality has not been satisfactory
as of late. During your visit we also discussed the possibility of reallocating some of this business
to a secondary source. This still holds true so please keep this in mind.
As I stated earlier, this is a follow-up to our quality assurance concerns with the DC Pump
Messanie Engineering supplies for Faraon. To maintain the current relationship between our
two companies we would like to move forward and resolve this issue in the near future. I
look forward to discussing these possibilities with you soon.
Callista Carver
Plant 93 Quality Assurance
Faraon Industries, Inc.
816-901-4772
cal635@faron.com