Traceability: The golden calf (revisited)

Conference · Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 1990

OSTI ID:6877970

Reed, R P

The ancient religious symbol of the golden calf has become a present day metaphor for a tangible but specious object that diverts the attention from an intangible, authentic, and crucial entity that it purports to represent. Peter Stein, measurement guru, for several years (1962 et seq.) has noted that calibration traceability has taken on the character of a Golden Calf.'' He has cautioned that with the present day emphasis on formal quality assurance in measurement, calibration traceability as a primary attestation of accuracy can be disproportionately emphasized to the detriment of actual measurement accuracy. This seemingly paradoxical claim is well-founded as illustrated by many examples where the more important issues of measurement qualification, validation, system characterization, and transient correction are recognized as affecting end accuracy much more critically than usual calibration errors. This paper extends Stein's areas of concern and reviews several practical examples where instrument errors of the magnitude typically revealed in standards laboratory calibration are dwarfed by the more generally consequential measurement errors of misapplication and naive reliance on highly accurate laboratory calibration of component instruments. The purpose of the paper is not to denigrate calibration nor its traceability. Rather, it is to caution that experimenters, standards and specifications writers, calibration laboratories, and measurement quality auditors must recognize these two important aspects of quality assurance as merely a partial, and certainly not a predominant, tool for the assurance of accuracy and quality in measurement. 12 refs., 1 figs.

• Research Organization: Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (USA)
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE/DP
• DOE Contract Number: AC04-76DP00789
• OSTI ID: 6877970
• Report Number(s): SAND-89-2878C; CONF-9008134-1; ON: DE90015716
• Resource Relation: Conference: 1990 national conference of standards laboratories (NCSL) symposium and workshop, Washington, DC (USA), 19-23 Aug 1990
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION
MEASURING INSTRUMENTS
CALIBRATION
MEASURING METHODS
ERRORS
ACCURACY
DOCUMENTATION
FLOWSHEETS
QUALITY CONTROL
RELIABILITY
RESPONSE FUNCTIONS
SPECIFICATIONS
STANDARDS
TEMPERATURE CONTROL
THERMOCOUPLES
THERMOMETERS
TRANSDUCERS
VALIDATION
CONTROL
DIAGRAMS
FUNCTIONS
TESTING
440500* - Thermal Instrumentation- (1990-)