ISO 16232 and VDA19 Standards

ISO 16232 / VDA: What Are These Standards and What You Need to Know Surface cleanliness is one of the areas that affects the surface quality of engineering parts in terms of both the finished part itself and how that part interacts with other components. ISO 16232 and VDA19 standards aim to establish a working level that will help ensure equal conditions for cleanliness across operations. VDA is a German safety system standard (Verband der Automobilindustrie). It is specific to the automotive industry and was created to improve workplace safety. As the organization grew, its scope of work changed significantly since its founding in 1970 and now includes quality management in its portfolio. Its standards have become recognized worldwide and their effects help shape the direction of the automotive industry. ISO 16232 was first published in 2007 and was specific to road vehicle manufacturing. It has undergone several modifications since its initial draft, but fundamentally describes the principles of removing contaminants and particles from a component using a type of pressurized rinsing. The objectives of ISO 16232 are: • To improve the comparability of cleanliness inspection results, • To incorporate new techniques (extraction and analysis), and • To provide guidance on how to define cleanliness specifications and explain how to respond when cleanliness threshold values are exceeded. To achieve effective cleanliness measurement, several factors must be considered: Materials are an obvious starting point, followed by identifying contamination sources such as machining methods, lubricating oils, cooling fluids, washing fluids, external contaminants, etc. In addition, personnel working in the operation can create their own effects. Trained personnel can be more careful in handling processed products and thus reduce possible contamination sources. The final stages of the process are filtration methods, cleaning methods and ultimately cleanliness measurement procedures. All these stages and processes leave a trace in the finished product. This trace is what ISO 16232 is concerned with, and the entire framework aims to provide a methodology for both identifying and eliminating contaminants and improving quality throughout the entire manufacturing process. VDA 19 was first introduced to the market in 2004. Since then, it has received numerous updates in line with changing policies and increased scientific understanding of related processes. The standard shares many similarities with ISO 16232 and is divided into the following areas: • Initial inspection and assessment, • Inspection of incoming and outgoing components, and • Quality control or monitoring of production processes related to cleanliness (e.g. cleaning, surface treatment and assembly processes).     VDA 19 and ISO 16232 work hand in hand to cover the entire range of standardization relating to processes involved in the manufacture and cleanliness of components for motor vehicles. Any business deciding to adhere to these two standard levels can establish itself in the world market rather than in a local or country-specific one. Of course, as with everything, achieving these standards is only part of the story. Once at this operating level, standards must be maintained and all personnel and processes must be kept under control to at least these levels. Any business's reputation is only as good as its completed final work.

Revealing/Extracting Contaminants

To analyze contaminant particles on component surfaces, we must first separate them from the surface. This process is called extraction. We now have various methods to remove dirt from the surface and transfer it to a liquid medium: We use spraying, floating, rinsing and ultrasonic cleaning techniques to clean the component. We collect the extracted particles on a filter membrane and prepare them for further analysis.

Particle Analysis

With technical cleanliness verification, we detect and analyze contamination on the relevant surfaces of an inspection object as completely as possible. In this way, you can protect your product quality and prevent any type of systematic contamination from the production process or environment that causes damage such as bearing or sliding surface jamming, blocked valves or clogged filters and nozzles. Depending on the analysis depth you require, we have various analysis methods available: 1. Particle analysis with polarized light. 2. Fully automatic particle analysis with SEM-EDX. 3. Fully automatic particle analysis through spectral comparison (RAMAN, FTIR). 4. Optical particle counting for fluids. References • https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/#iso:std:iso:16232:ed-1:v1:en • https://www.en-standard.eu/vda-19.1-inspection-of-technical-cleanliness-particulate-contamination-offunctionally-relevant-automotive-components-/-2nd-revised-edition-march-2015-former-title-vda-volume-19/ • https://kumi-solutions.com/iso-16232-vda-19-what-are-they-and-why-do-i-need-to-know-about-them/ • https://www.bva.com.tr/glaeser/ • https://www.qa-group.com/index.php/en/services/technical-cleanliness verification/particulate-contamination/ • https://mkf-automation.de/en/technical-cleanliness-and-cleanroom/consulting-on-vda19-and-iso-14644-1 • https://www.cleancontrolling.com/en/technical/products-services/analytics/a-focus-on-particles-technicalcleanliness/standard-cleanliness-inspection-/-residual-particle contamination-analysis •https://www.pressebox.com/pressrelease/duerr-ecoclean-gmbh/EcoCLab-fully-automatic-VD Associate Professor Ekrem Altuncu TÜYİDER (All Surface Treatment Association) Board Member Sakarya University of Applied Sciences Materials and Production Technologies Application and Research Center – SUMAR Director