Patent ID: 7493181

Claim:
A method for utilizing an RFID tag in manufacturing comprising the steps of: storing data for an initial manufacturing event in an as built history on the RFID tag associated with a manufactured assembly; storing additional data for a second manufacturing event into the as built history on the RFID tag, wherein the manufacturing events include a part number and other data for a plurality of prior sub-assemblies that comprise the manufactured assembly; wherein the step of storing the additional data for the second manufacturing event comprises reading the data for the initial manufacturing event and concatenating the data for the second manufacturing event and storing the concatenated data in a dynamically linked list in the as built history; wherein the RFID tag comprises a micro-controller to control commands received from the RFID reader to store the plurality of manufacturing events in the dynamically linked list; and wherein the initial and second manufacturing events include a vendor ID, a part number, a serial number, a date and time, a quality status parameter that includes a good/no good indication of the usability of the assembly, and other associated data for each manufacturing event.