Quality assurance for design control of a transmission and distribution substation

Abstract

This research is to develop a design quality plan for a transmission and distribution substation in Engineering Division within a multi-national company named XYZ (alias). The company delivered a turnkey electrical substation project to the customer including after sales service and maintenance. Since the engineering work is very crucial, this research focuses only activities in engineering division which is responsible for all technical matter during handling the project. The writer has used the failure mode and effect analysis (FMEA) as a quality tool for analyzing the potential failure modes and their effects in the engineering work for electrical substation in a systematic way. From the study, the writer has discovered three major problems in the engineering work. These include (1) lack of procedures to design, (2) lack of the document and data control, and (3) technical problems. The result of these problems mainly affects the overall of the project. The company also has problems with making on time delivery and errors during project implementation. The results of the analysis by using the FMEA technique have led to the establishment of the quality assurance for design control of electrical substation which include standard procedure , design check lists and forms (D01-D16) and working manual (WM01-WM20). The working manual contains the useful engineering knowledge, information and method of substation design work. The established quality assurance has been implemented in the design of an electrical substation project in the company and resulted in an improvement in the design schedule and technical matters compared with the last five projects. This included the financial cost of the project which was also reduced in terms of man hours charge, material and etc.