Quality control inspectors examine products and materials for defects or deviations from specifications.
Quality control inspectors typically do the following:
- Read blueprints and specifications
- Monitor operations
- Recommend adjustments to production process
- Inspect, test, or measure materials
- Accept or reject finished items
- Remove all products that fail to meet specifications
- Discuss inspection results
- Report inspection and test data
Quality control inspectors, for example, ensure that the food or medicine you take will not make you sick, that your car will run properly, and that your pants will not split the first time you wear them. These workers monitor quality standards for nearly all manufactured products, including foods, textiles, clothing, glassware, motor vehicles, electronic components, computers, and structural steel. Specific job duties vary across the wide range of industries in which these inspectors work.
Quality control workers rely on many tools to do their jobs. Although some still use hand-held measurement devices, such as calipers and alignment gauges, workers more commonly operate electronic inspection equipment, such as coordinate-measuring machines (CMMs). Inspectors testing electrical devices may use voltmeters, ammeters, and ohmmeters to test the potential difference, current flow, and resistance, respectively.