Wichita State University’s National Institute for Aviation Research (NIAR) has earned accreditations to ISO/IEC 17025-2005 and ANSI/NCSL Z540-1-1994.
The American Association for Laboratory Accreditation (A2LA) ISO/IEC17025:2005 accreditation verifies that NIAR meets “general requirements for the competence of calibration and testing laboratories.” NIAR also chose to seek accreditation to the American national standard ANSI/NCSL Z540-1-1994 as an optional accreditation.
The accreditations are required in order for NIAR to do business with certain organizations. They increase NIAR capabilities for current clients and open doors to new potential clients.
“NIAR has always maintained high quality standards, but it was time to adopt a globally recognized system,” said Tom Aldag, director of R&D. “Implementation of standard processes is reassuring to both new and long-term NIAR clients. The industry has evolved to expect this level of commitment and attention to quality.”
Implementation as part of laboratory quality initiatives provides both laboratory and business benefits by increasing access to contracts, improving the national and global reputation, continually improving data quality and laboratory effectiveness, and providing a basis for other quality systems for use in the future,” said quality assurance engineer Keith Fitzgeralds.
According to Walter Lee, director of quality and performance, Fitzgeralds was crucial to NIAR’s accreditation efforts.
“The road to accreditation was quite a lengthy process,” Fitzgeralds said.
Preparations began 10 months ago and the actual application to A2LA was submitted on May 9, 2011. The onsite assessment took place during a two-day period in July.
This accreditation also fulfills a requirement for applying for Nadcap certification, which is another goal of the institute.
”The Nadcap certification, however, will involve the entire composites group, and has at least another six months to go before it can be attained,” said Fitzgeralds.
About NIAR
The National Institute for Aviation Research (NIAR) at Wichita State University supports the aviation industry by providing research, development, testing and certification services to manufacturers, government agencies and education entities. NIAR laboratories include: Advanced Coatings, Advanced Joining & Processing, Aging Aircraft, CAD/CAM, Composites & Advanced Materials, Computational Mechanics, Crash Dynamics, Environmental Test, Full-Scale Structural Test, Mechanical Test, Metrology, Nondestructive Test, Research Machine Shop, Virtual Reality and the Walter H. Beech Wind Tunnel. NIAR operates on a nonprofit budget that has steadily increased to more than $45 million in fiscal year 2010. NIAR is the largest university aviation R&D institution in the U.S. With its location in Wichita, Kan., the “Air Capital of the World,” NIAR is able to integrate business, government and university entities in cooperative efforts to advance aviation technology. NIAR operates more than 250,000 square feet of laboratory and office space and employs 350. Clients include Boeing, Bombardier Learjet, Cessna, Hawker Beechcraft and Spirit AeroSystems.