Alan Metzel
Quality Engineer
Northrop Grumman

A native of Western Maryland, where he and his wife still reside, he earned an AS (Hagerstown Community College) and a BSME (University of Tennessee).  As Gear Manufacturing Engineer, Mack Trucks Power Train for over twenty years, he was responsible for the development and implementation of manufacturing and inspection methods for transmission and diesel/gas turbine engine components.  The past ten years Al has worked as Quality Engineer Mechanical Fabrication/Integration at Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems.  He serves on the Coordinate Measuring Society Certification Committee and a Level III Shearographer.  Al also serves on the ASTM Nondestructive Testing and 3D Imaging System Committees.

PRESENTATION: PCMM Certification Progress
With the advent of Portable Coordinate Measuring Machines (PCMMs), such as articulating arms, laser trackers, scanners and photogrammetry systems, such diverse fields as manufacturing, civil engineering, archeology and forensics have added these instruments to their toolbox. Over the past ten years, the number of PCMM operators has grown exponentially.

Certification of these operators has been a legitimate, lingering concern among many professionals for more than a decade. How does an employer or contractor know if an operator is truly trained and has the necessary expertise to select the proper equipment, or to develop and execute a plan to correctly, accurately capture data in a repeatable manner?

Since 2008, at industry request, a subcommittee of the Coordinate Metrology Society has been collecting data, processing survey results, and developing a proposal for an accredited certification program. It is the intent of this presentation to, in an interactive format,  inform the attendees of the background, history, and progress of this undertaking, as well as, receive further valuable input from the attendees as to the most desirable structure and means of implementation of  such a certification program.