Are technical drawings necessary?

I work in the lighting industry- pedestrian scale light fixtures- and
the majority of our manufactured parts are die and sand cast. Before I
came to this company the process was to design the parts in 3d CAD,
create a technical drawing with only critical fit and function
dimensions (mostly for inspection purposes) and only qualify vendors
who would make the part from the model. The main reason for this is
each part will only have maybe 10-15 critical dimensions, but a
considerable amount of cosmetic surfaces that are difficult and timely
to dimension.
Now, however, because of quality issues, we are starting to go back to
full dimensioning so that we have back-up when the vendor produces a
sub-par part. I think that having a written clause in the purchase
order and well as a note on the drawing stating "Part must meet
critical dimensions and match 3d model within acceptable tolerances"
should be enough.
Question: How does your company deal with this process? Are there any
good solutions you have come up with? Do we really just have to go
back to the days of full dimensioning?
thank-you!
** If there's a better place to post this question let me know, I love
solidworks so i'm posting here =)