Be an informed consumer!

[Rara]

I am an engineer as well. I work in a lab environment as well as out in the field and the company I work for does engineering consulting for several industries who cater to Uncle Sam as well as some domestic industry.

Rara, In the future do you see companies who produce firearms parts having to become AS9100 compliant? ALL companies who produce aerospace and ordinance for the govt are required to have this certification.

I don't, at least not any time soon. The reason is, there is no industry watchdog group for the firearm industry like an SAE or SME type group that could push it through for non-Gov't contractors. Quality systems like AS9100 really are just paperwork tracking systems anyway, ie, do what you said you were going to do, and prove that you did it that way. If the firearm company doesn't have good process controls, they aren't going to suddenly add them to thier documentation. All it would net would be the same companies making the same sub-standard components, only now they would have clear documentation stating that they had been made exactly as they had intended to make them in the first place.

On Edit - After thinking about a little more, I guess that last part isn't 100% accurate. AS9100 does include a lot more of the how to do it right type stuff, on metrology, traceability, design methodology etc, than say ISO. But I think the key is there is still no cross-industry group driving such a requirement.