Send-out POs that carry the print's spec, and certs checked when the parts come back.

Between operations, a lot goes to the plater, passivator, anodizer or heat treater. Someone turns the print's finish and heat treat notes into a PO, counts the parts, adds masking and cert requirements, puts the vendor's turnaround on the traveler, then checks the packing slip and cert when the lot returns.

In the proof of concept, AI works from copies of send-outs you already made. It drafts each PO line from the print and traveler, works out when the lot is due back, and compares the cert that came back with the PO. Anything the print leaves to the vendor becomes a question, and anything on the cert that doesn't match is flagged.

A plating note is a set of choices. Zinc to ASTM B633 is ordered by type, which sets what goes over the zinc: as plated, a colored or colorless chromate, a phosphate, or a colorless or colored trivalent coating. It also takes a service condition from SC1 to SC4, which sets the minimum thickness from 0.0002 in. up to 0.0010 in. A customer that requires RoHS-compliant parts generally rules out the hexavalent chromates, and ASTM notes that Types V and VI hold no leachable hexavalent chromium, so "yellow zinc" on an old print is worth a question. Electroless nickel to ASTM B733 adds a type for phosphorus content, a service condition from SC0 to SC4, and a class for any heat treatment after plating. A print that says only "zinc plate" or "electroless nickel" leaves those choices to the plater, so the draft lists them as questions.

Hard steel needs a bake. Plating can drive hydrogen into high-strength steel, so B633 calls for relief baking on those parts, and ASTM B850 is the guide to post-coating bakes. The hardness at which the bake becomes required differs between revisions of B633, so the draft reads which revision the print or PO names and carries the part's hardness onto the PO line. A hardened part headed to the plater with no bake on the PO is flagged before it leaves.

"Passivate per ASTM A967" is not one instruction. The spec offers nitric acid, citric acid and electrochemical treatments in several numbered variants, plus tests to show the passivation worked, among them water immersion, high humidity, salt spray and copper sulfate. Passivators often ask for the alloy and the acceptance test when a PO names only the spec. The draft puts the alloy, the treatment if the print names one, and the test onto the PO line, and asks when the print is silent. The alloy matters on its own, because free-machining grades such as 303 are easier to damage in the bath than 304 or 316.

Certs report what was actually done. A heat treat cert should give the process and the hardness the treater measured, so it can be held against the print's callout, for example a Rockwell C range on a tool steel part. Anodized parts go out by finish and color, with the threads and bores to be masked marked on the print or a sketch. When a lot returns, the draft compares the vendor's cert and packing slip with its PO line: spec and revision, type or class, hardness, quantity, and your job or lot number.

The traveler has to know when parts are back. The outside operation's vendor turnaround stands in for its run time, and the draft sets a due-back date from the lead time you give for each vendor, flags jobs whose ship date no longer fits, and drafts a status check when a lot is late. Your reviewer, whoever writes and chases send-outs today (often the buyer or production control lead), sets each draft beside the PO your shop actually sent and the cert that actually came back.

After a yes, each job that reaches an outside operation gets a draft PO, and each returning lot gets a cert check, for about 30 days.

Your buyer approves, edits or rejects every PO and sends it, and your receiving inspector accepts or holds every lot. The scoring table stays in use for the whole month.