Illustrates the use of systems such as in-process control, quality auditing, and specifications, stressing a troubleshooting, cost-effective approach to product packaging for maximized early lead time to the customer. Addressing the needs of the pharmaceutical industry, the approaches supplied are l

Covers experiment planning, execution, analysis, and reporting This single-source resource guides readers in planning and conducting credible experiments for engineering, science, industrial processes, agriculture, and business. The text takes experimenters all the way through conducting a high-impact experiment, from initial conception, through execution of the experiment, to a defensible final report. It prepares the reader to anticipate the choices faced during each stage. Filled with real-world examples from engineering science and industry, Planning and Executing Credible Experiments: A Guidebook for Engineering, Science, Industrial Processes, Agriculture, and Business offers chapters that challenge experimenters at each stage of planning and execution and emphasizes uncertainty analysis as a design tool in addition to its role for reporting results. Tested over decades at Stanford University and internationally, the text employs two powerful, free, open-source software tools: GOSSET to optimize experiment design, and R for statistical computing and graphics. A website accompanies the text, providing additional resources and software downloads. A comprehensive guide to experiment planning, execution, and analysis Leads from initial conception, through the experiment's launch, to final report Prepares the reader to anticipate the choices faced throughout an experiment Hones the motivating question Employs principles and techniques from Design of Experiments (DoE) Selects experiment designs to obtain the most information from fewer experimental runs Offers chapters that propose questions that an experimenter will need to ask and answer during each stage of planning and execution Demonstrates how uncertainty analysis guides and strengthens each stage Includes examples from real-life industrial experiments Accompanied by a website hosting open-source software Planning and Executing Credible Experiments is an excellent resource for graduates and senior undergraduates--as well as professionals--across a wide variety of engineering disciplines.

If your goal is 100% zero defects, here is the book for you -- a completely illustrated guide to poka-yoke (mistake-proofing) for supervisors and shop-floor workers. Many poka-yoke ideas come from line workers and are implemented with the help of engineering staff or tooling or machine specialists. The result is better product quality and greater participation by workers in efforts to improve your processes, your products, and your company as a whole.

The first section of the book uses a simple, illustrated format to summarize many of the concepts and main features of poka-yoke. The second section shows 240 examples of poka-yoke improvements implemented in Japanese plants.

The book:

• Organizes examples according to the broad issue or problem they address.
• Pinpoints how poka-yoke applies to specific devices, parts and products, categories of improvement methods, and processes.
• Provides sample improvement forms for you to sketch out your own ideas.

Use Poka-yoke in study groups as a model for your improvement efforts. It may be your single most important step toward eliminating defects completely. (For an industrial engineering perspective on how source inspection and poka-yoke can work together to reduce defects to zero, see Shigeo Shingo's Zero Quality Control.)

This is a comprehensive, user-friendly and hands-on book that is a single source of reference of tools and techniques for all quality practitioners. Implementing Six Sigma and Lean covers the basics of how to manage for consistently high quality and gives good coverage of both simple tools and advanced techniques which can be used in all businesses. This book provides guidance on how to use these tools for different situations such as new start-up companies, stalled projects and the constant achievement of high quality in well-established quality regimes. Case studies are included that encourage the reader to respond in a practical situations and provide a good learning resource for courses. There are summaries of key elements and questions with exercises at the end of each chapter.

The Routledge Handbook of Communication Disorders provides an update on key issues and research in the clinical application of the speech, language and hearing sciences in both children and adults.

Focusing on areas of cutting edge research, this "Handbook" showcases we know about communication disorders, and their assessment and treatment. It emphasizes the application of theory to clinical practice throughout, and is arranged by the four key bases of communication impairments:

• Neural/Genetic Bases
• Perceptual-Motor Bases
• Cognitive-Linguistic Bases
• Socio-cultural Bases.

The "Handbook "ends with an integrative section, which looks at innovative ways of working across domains to arrive at novel assessment and treatment ideas. It is an important reference work for researchers, students and practitioners working in communication science and speech and language therapy.

Although regularly introducing new products or services is the lifeblood of most industries, bringing them to market can be fraught with peril. Timing, cost, and quality all play important roles in a successful product launch and avoiding expensive - often in more than just dollars - recalls and redesigns. Quality Assurance: Applying Methodologies for Launching New Products, Services, and Customer Satisfaction details continual improvement (CI), a proven process for avoiding common problems and creating customer satisfaction. The book explores the three fundamental approaches required to create a truly CI culture in any organization: a) consistent philosophy of improvement by management, b) receptive organizational culture, and c) the entire culture of the organization must be willing to make decisions based on measurement and data. It outlines the seven principles: research/plan, assure, explain, prioritize, demonstrate, confirm, and show. However, as with CI itself, this attitude must be incorporated into the processes of any organization and create products or services for the market place that will delight customers rather than just satisfying them. Time and cost constraints are the biggest culprits here, not any one person's lack of due diligence. When this happens, organizations must look at the bigger picture internally and identify it as a system problem. Based on the author's 35 years of experience, this book covers the essential items for doing the right thing the first time especially during launching a good product and/or service to the customer. It identifies key indicators and methodologies that will help you attain excellent performance, delivery, and cost with both the customer and supplier. In other words, by following these methodologies and indicators, the job will get done right the first time.

The process of discovery in science and technology may require investigation of a large number of features, such as factors, genes or molecules. In Screening, designed experiments and statistical analyses of the resulting data sets are used to identify efficiently the few features that determine key properties of the system under study.

This book brings together accounts by leading international experts that are essential reading for those working in fields such as industrial quality improvement, engineering research and development, genetic and medical screening, drug discovery, and computer simulation of manufacturing systems or economic models. Our aim is to promote cross-fertilization of ideas and methods through detailed explanations, a variety of examples and extensive references.

Topics cover both physical and computer simulated experiments. They include screening methods for detecting factors that affect the value of a response or its variability, and for choosing between various different response models. Screening for disease in blood samples, for genes linked to a disease and for new compounds in the search for effective drugs are also described. Statistical techniques include Bayesian and frequentist methods of data analysis, algorithmic methods for both the design and analysis of experiments, and the construction of fractional factorial designs and orthogonal arrays.

The material is accessible to graduate and research statisticians, and to engineers and chemists with a working knowledge of statistical ideas and techniques. It will be of interest to practitioners and researchers who wish to learn about useful methodologies from within their own areaas well as methodologies that can be translated from one area to another.

Business Process Reengineering BreakPoint Strategies for Market Dominance Business Process Reengineering shows you how to take the vital next step to attain market dominance and become a world leader
* A team of internationally recognized Coopers & Lybrand manufacturing consultants explain why they believe the business world needs to move beyond continuous improvement and TQM concepts to Business Process Reengineering (BPR).

* BPR involves a dramatic redesign of business processes, organization structures and use of technology, to achieve "breakthroughs" in business competitiveness.

* The book is based on the authors experience of extensive international work with leading corporations including AT&T, Asea Brown Boveri (ABB), Allied-Signal, and Coca-Cola & Schweppes (CC&SB).

* Focusing on the effectiveness of BPR, the book shows how companies can streamline operations, and inevitably cut costs, on the way to creating process excellence in all key aspects of the organization.
Reengineering goes beyond continuous improvement "Continuous improvement is exactly the right idea if you are the world leader it is probably a disastrous idea if you are far behind in the world standard we need rapid, quantum-leap improvement. We cannot be satisfied to lay out a plan that will move us towards the existing world standard over some protracted period of time if we accept such a plan; we will never be the world leader." Paul O Neill, Chairman ALCOA

The book is written for anyone who wants to design experiments, carry them out, and analyze the results. The authors provide a clear-cut, practical approach to designing experiments in any discipline and explain the general principles upon which such design is based. The reader then can apply these theories to any specific problem in his own work. No advanced mathematics is needed to utilize Design of Experiments - the necessary statistical concepts and briefly reviewed in the first two chapters. Subsequent chapters explain why and how the design of experiments in an intrinsic part of the scientific method, what problems will be encountered by the researcher in setting up his experiment and how to deal with them, and how to accurately analyze the result in terms of the sample taken and the method used. Each chapter includes problems encountered in specific fields so that the reader can test himself on his comprehension of the material. The diversity of the applications that these problems encompass also allows the reader to grasp the basic principles that unite the statistical approach to experiment design. Researchers and students in engineering, agriculture, pharmacy, veterinary science, chemistry, biology, the social; sciences, statistics, mathematics, or any other field that requires the design, solution, and analysis of problems will find this book absolutely indispensable.

As projects become more complex and the project teams are more geographically and culturally dispersed, so strong, trusting relationships come to the fore. Trust provides the security that enables project teams to work together effectively, even when they face project-threatening problems and challenges. Because today's team members work virtually as much by choice as by geographic necessity, business leaders must understand how team relationships such as trust, cross-divisional projects, and how offshore team participation are all positively motivated by a solid quality assurance program. Offering real world solutions, Trust in Virtual Teams provides a clear view of how virtual projects can succeed, and how quality assurance compliments and promotes effective organizational design and project management to build solid trust relationships. Dr Wise combines the latest research in virtual team trust with simple and proven quality methods. He builds upon more than 20 years of experience in quality and project work to guide team managers in creating high performing project teams. Our understanding of the role human factors play in project performance and project resilience continues to grow. As it does, so does our need to address the behaviors and culture that enable good performance. Tom Wise's book is a thoughtful and pragmatic guide to help project teams and managers do just that.

Statistics for Quality Control is a basic level study of statistics used in a production operations setting. It is primarily intended for students entering quality control or other industrial and operations careers. It covers introductory topics such as a brief background, measurements, and graphing techniques. It then moves on to the beginning statistics necessary to understand these practices commonly found in industry and ends with coverage of quality assurance issues along with some pertinent managerial practices associated with this topic.Daniel Jackson is an Associate Professor of Architectural and Manufacturing Sciences at Western Kentucky University. He has more than 30 years of teaching and research experience in manufacturing operations and design, quality assurance and control, six sigma, lean concepts, and graduate courses. He works extensively with students by teaching, advising, and directing their career interests. He has traveled throughout the world teaching and conducting research. Preface. The Industrial Age. CH 1- Numbers, Measurements & Scales. CH 2- Sampling & Organization of Data. CH 3- Basic Statistics for Discrete Distributions. CH 4- Statistics for Continuous Distributions. CH 5- Statistical Process Control for Attributes. CH 6- Process Control for Variables. CH 7- Control Chart Analysis. CH 8- Acceptance Sampling. CH 9- Inferential Applications. CH 10- Additional Uses of Statistics in Industry. CH 11- Quality Management. Appendices.

For almost every sensationalized media report of product failure, a closer look often determines these failures occurred due to inadequate reliability theory and methodology. Current theories and practices cannot solve these problems, mainly because test specifications, especially lifetime tests, express their results as either pass or fail; these results thus provide little useful quantitative information. In a clear, concise presentation, Improving Reliability and Quality for Product Success discusses how to eradicate failures in hardware products and, consequently, achieve greater success in the marketplace.

Evolved from the author s more than thirty years of experience, the book redefines quality and reliability terminology, explains failure mechanics, and analyzes why reliability accidents occur in the products of established corporations. The author presents a new prevention methodology in easily understood qualitative and scientific terms. Without excess discussions of the complex related mathematics, he creates principles that enable readers to identify problems before product release into the market. These novel concepts and methodology can reduce product troubles by establishing test specifications that produce quantified outcomes that constitute conclusive judgment data.

Many books that cover reliability theory/engineering/practice are geared towards professionals with advanced mathematical skills and would not necessarily be of use to executives and CEOs, who may not be quality or reliability experts but need to understand these principles when making decisions. This book addresses this important but neglected audience, introducing novel ideas based on back-to basics quality/reliability concepts in an easily understood manner. In addition, it explains basic, fresh new methods for maximizing customer satisfaction and securing a competitive edge in performance.

As a society, we tend to reward problem solvers, rather than those who prevent problems at their source. In other words, we focus on after-the-fact occurrences (appraisal activities) instead of trying to eliminate these occurrences (preventing activities). Discussing and evaluating the core requirements of quality efficiency and improvement, 10 Essentials for High Performance Quality in the 21st Century proposes an approach to help shift the paradigm of quality from appraisal mode to preventing mode. Identifying 10 steps readers can follow to optimize the quality of products and improve customer satisfaction, the book explains the rationale behind each of the steps in separate chapters. It addresses specific quality issues in six different sectors of the economy and provides statistics, tables, and figures from various organizations that support the need for a paradigm shift. Outlining a systematic process to guide your organization along the path toward improvement, the book covers risk and quality, multicultural management, empowerment, error analysis, team building, advanced quality planning, and quality operating systems. The accompanying downloadable resources provide tips and tools to help you implement all the necessary improvement initiatives under the umbrella of quality.

In an era of intense competition where plant operating efficiencies must be maximized, downtime due to machinery failure has become more costly. To cut operating costs and increase revenues, industries have an urgent need to predict fault progression and remaining lifespan of industrial machines, processes, and systems. An engineer who mounts an acoustic sensor onto a spindle motor wants to know when the ball bearings will wear out without having to halt the ongoing milling processes. A scientist working on sensor networks wants to know which sensors are redundant and can be pruned off to save operational and computational overheads. These scenarios illustrate a need for new and unified perspectives in system analysis and design for engineering applications.

Intelligent Diagnosis and Prognosis of Industrial Networked Systems proposes linear mathematical tool sets that can be applied to realistic engineering systems. The book offers an overview of the fundamentals of vectors, matrices, and linear systems theory required for intelligent diagnosis and prognosis of industrial networked systems. Building on this theory, it then develops automated mathematical machineries and formal decision software tools for real-world applications.

The book includes portable tool sets for many industrial applications, including:

• Forecasting machine tool wear in industrial cutting machines
• Reduction of sensors and features for industrial fault detection and isolation (FDI)
• Identification of critical resonant modes in mechatronic systems for system design of R&D
• Probabilistic small-signal stability in large-scale interconnected power systems
• Discrete event command and control for military applications

The book also proposes future directions for intelligent diagnosis and prognosis in energy-efficient manufacturing, life cycle assessment, and systems of systems architecture. Written in a concise and accessible style, it presents tools that are mathematically rigorous but not involved. Bridging academia, research, and industry, this reference supplies the know-how for engineers and managers making decisions about equipment maintenance, as well as researchers and students in the field.

During day-to-day use, thousands of lives are lost each year due to accidents, directly or indirectly, resulting from poor transportation system reliability and safety. In the United States, automobile accidents alone result in around 42,000 deaths per year, costing billions of dollars to the economy each year. A common subject in journal articles and conference proceedings, most of the recent research on transportation systems reliability and safety is scattered in different resources. Until now. Drawing together the latest research spread throughout the literature, Transportation Systems Reliability and Safety eliminates the need to consult many different and diverse sources to obtain up-to-date information and research. It contains a chapter on mathematical concepts and another chapter on reliability and safety basics that form a foundation for understanding the contents of subsequent chapters. The book also presents a chapter devoted to methods for performing transportation system reliability and safety analysis. It includes a reference section at the end of each chapter for readers who wish to delve deeper into a specific area. The author clearly and concisely covers topics in such a manner that readers require no previous knowledge to understand the concepts. He provides examples and their solutions as well as numerous problems at the end of each chapter to test reader comprehension. The presentation of historical information paired with recent research give readers a foundation for understanding where the field is now and snapshot of where it may be going.

Considering that the biggest machines that do the most work are made up of smaller machines and components, it becomes obvious that when a large machine breaks, it is normally due to small components acting antagonistically. Detailing a time-tested method for increasing productivity and lowering operational costs, Spend Analysis and Specification Development Using Failure Interpretation explains how to establish performance-based procurement specifications for the components, devices, and items that contribute the most to operational downtime and repair/replacement costs. The book emphasizes the critical need to perform both spend and failure analysis in order to develop a procurement document, which will ultimately reduce overall costs. Accompanied by downloadable resources with helpful material such as, specification checklists, case study worksheets, form letters, and return on investment (ROI) worksheets that you can customize to your needs, the text discusses how to: Identify the products that will cost the most if they fail Develop performance-based procurement specifications to reduce direct and indirect costs Examine cost analysis as it relates to operations, maintenance, and production Determine effective criteria based on properties, test results, and standards for each operation Written by an industry expert with decades of experience giving seminars, training customers and associates, and authoring numerous papers and articles, the text provides the real-world understanding of the influential components and materials' physical properties needed to engage in effective failure and spend analysis. It addresses product submission and monitoring and includes helpful tools so you can immediately get started on conducting your own cost-saving analysis.

An effective visual communication system can help manufacturing employees eliminate significant waste from daily tasks. From work-zone color coding to posted metrics, visual controls clarify and simplify the path to enhanced processes and profits. Leaving little to chance, Visual Controls: Applying Visual Management to the Factory provides a detailed explanation of how to apply the Lean principles of 5S to convert your factory to a fully functioning Visual Workplace. It covers the range of methods that collectively compose an effective visual management system and clearly explains management's role in creating a Lean strategy to accomplish the transformation. This book: * Considers visual Kanban, material replenishment, and the implementation of a visual maintenance department * Details management's role in implementing and sustaining a visual factory * Covers the range of visual tools -- including tool boards, shadow boards, metrics communication boards, and tool check cards From plant layout and department setup to visual tools and parts, this book facilitates the comprehensive understanding required to initiate positive change through visual communication. The authors supply authoritative insight on how to hasten the required cultural changes, as well as step-by-step instruction for creating visual shadow boards. They also highlight time-tested methods for measuring progress and performance with improved accuracy.

Today, multi-functional materials such as piezoelectric/ferroelectric ceramics, magneto-strictive and shape memory alloys are gaining increasing applications as sensors, actuators or smart composite materials systems for emerging high tech areas. The stable performance and reliability of these smart components under complex service loads is of paramount practical importance. However, most multi-functional materials suffer from various mechanical and/or electro-magnetical degra-dation mechanisms as fatigue, damage and fracture. Therefore, this exciting topic has become a challenge to intensive international research, provoking the interdisciplinary approach between solid mechanics, materials science and physics. This book summarizes the outcome of the above mentioned IUTAM-symposium, assembling contributions by leading scientists in this area. Particularly, the following topics have been addressed: (1) Development of computational methods for coupled electromechanical field analysis, especially extended, adaptive and multi-level finite elements. (2) Constitutive modeling of non-linear smart material behavior with coupled electric, magnetic, thermal and mechanical fields, primarily based on micro-mechanical models. (3) Investigations of fracture and fatigue in piezoelectric and ferroelectric ceramics by means of process zone modeling, phase field simulation and configurational mechanics. (4) Reliability and durability of sensors and actuators under in service loading by alternating mechanical, electrical and thermal fields. (5) Experimental methods to measure fracture strength and to investigate fatigue crack growth in ferroelectric materials under electromechanical loading. (6) New ferroelectric materials, compounds and composites with enhanced strain capabilities.

This book presents a collection of real cases from industrial practices that production system and quality managers implement to ensure a high quality as well as a low cost in products. This book is divided in sections that are focused on: * The quality and philosophies implemented to production systems; starting from the product design as well as from the supply system. * The principal statistical techniques applied to the quality assurance (statistical quality control, analysis of tests and failure, quality function deployment, accelerated life tests, among others), the process of gathering information, its validation, its reliability process, and techniques for data analysis. * The techniques applied to the integration of human resources in the process of quality assurance, such as managers and operators' participation, training, and training processes. * Use of information and communications technologies, software, and programs implemented to guarantee the quality of the products in the production systems. ISO standards and policies that are used for quality management and monitoring.

This text provides the reader with a general and widely-applicable problem solving strategy for use in quality improvement. It covers a variety of statistical and "non-statistical" problem-solving tools, and discusses techniques that are useful when problems are solved by groups or teams of people. It also shows how the success of problem solving is influenced by the style of management and the type of management-employee interaction.

Richard Bellmann developed a theory of dynamic programming which is for many reasons still in the center of great interest. The authors present a new approach in the ?eld of the optimization and multi-objective control of time-discrete systems which is closely related to the work of Richard Bellmann. They develop their own concept and their extension to the optimization and multi-objective control of time-discrete systems as well as to dynamic networks and multilayered structures are very stimulating for further research. Di?erent perspectives of discrete control and optimal dynamic ?ow problems on networks are treated and characterized. Together with the algorithmic solutions a framework of multi-objective control problems is - rived. The conclusion with a real world example underlines the necessity and - portance of their theoretic framework. As they come back to the classical Bellmann concept of dynamic programming they stress and honor his basic concept without debase their own work. Multilayereddecisionprocessesaspartofthedesignandanalysisofcomplexsystems and networks will be essential in many ways and ?elds in the future.

Complexity in automation- and safety systems in railway as well as automotive applications are dominated more and more by formal description means, methods and tools. Formal techniques provide next to correctness and integrity checkups - especially for safety relevant systems - the possibility to model, prove, simulate and check the specification of the system as well as to generate the system implementations. Requirements of the CENELEC- and IEC-Standards on formal techniques, particularly with regard to the handling of safety analysis, are to be treated in FORMS/FORMAT 2010. The main focus lies on topics facing formal techniques for railway applications and intelligent transportation systems as well as for automotive applications. Gained findings, experiences and also difficulties associated with the handling of the subject matter as well as description means and tools are to be shown.

The book provides background information about technical solutions, processes and methodology to develop future automated mobility solutions. Beginning from the legal requirements as the minimum tolerable risk level of the society, the book provides state-of-the-art risk-management methodologies. The system engineering approach based on todays engineering best practices enhanced by principles derived from cybernetics. The approach derived from the typical behaviour of a human driver in public road traffic to a cybernetical based system engineering approach. Beyond the system engineering approach, a common behaviour model for the operational domain will show aspects how to extend the system engineering model with principles of cybernetics. The role and the human factors of road traffic participants and drivers of motor vehicles are identified and several viewpoints for different observers show how such mixed traffic scenarios could be assessed and optimised. The influence of the changing mobility demands of the society and the resulting changes to the origination of producer, owner, driver and supplier show aspects for future liability and risk share option for new supply chains. Examples from various industries provide some well-proven engineering principles how to adapt those for the future mobility for the benefit of the users. The aim of the book is to raise awareness that the safety provided by a product, a means of transport or a system up to an entire traffic system depends on the capabilities of the various actors. In addition to the driver and passengers, there are also other road users, maintenance personnel and service providers, who must have certain abilities to act safely in traffic. These are also the capabilities of the organisation, not only the organisation that develops or brings the product to market, but also the organisation that is responsible for the operation and the whole lifecycle of the products. The book is for people who want to get involved in the mobility of the future. People, that have ideas to become a player who want to help shape the future mobility of society and who want to bring responsible solutions for users into the market.

Offering a model, an implementing strategy, as well as traditional and nontraditional methods for the successful enhancement and maintenance of quality, this work establishes a rationale for the continuation of Total Quality Management (TQM) in all organizations. It considers leading quality-related topics, such as unusual charts, supplier-organization-customer relationships, customer needs and expectations, instructional design, adult learning, advanced quality planning, and reliability.