Certificate of Conformance vs. Long Form Certification

Certification of Conformance
This is basically a generic slip of paper which states that the gage has been made to applicable industrial standards and measured with tools which are dimensionally traceable to the national standards, in this case NIST.

The paper does not state the gage size.
The paper does not identify the applicable standards.
The paper does not provide adequate traceability of the reference standards to the national standards.
The paper is mostly a manufacturer’s disclaimer and statement of warrantee limitations.
The paper is printed in bulk and is fully generic and interchangeable for any gage shipped by the gage maker.

Long Form Certification

This paper is a detailed inspection report and says the same thing as the Certification of Conformance except that:
The paper gives the gage size.
The paper gives the specific gage dimensions with the appropriate tolerances for each feature.
The paper discloses the actual values of the features as measured by the gage maker.

The paper supplies the traceability number for the master gages to the applicable national standards.

We insist on the Long Form Certification for any gage departing its country of origin because it forces the gage maker to take one last look at the gage before it is boxed for shipment. It is a cheap assurance policy and less expensive than shipping the gage back if there is error. It also supplies the end customer all the data required to have the gage calibrated locally.

Comments about the above statement can be sent to: gageguy@gagecrib.com