My Process is Out of Control! Now What Do I Do?


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Thanks so much for reading our publication. We hope you find it informative and useful. Happy charting and may the data always support your position.

Sincerely,

Dr. Bill McNeese
BPI Consulting, LLC

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Comments (5)

  • AnonymousJune 29, 2012 Reply

    Great read. You are really helping alot through this.

    Isn't there something missing in this statement:"You can put these control strategies into place, but useless you have a support system that encourages their use and reviews the results, your efforts will fail."

    • billJune 29, 2012 Reply

      Yes, I had "useless" instead of "unless". It is fixed now in the article. Thanks for the comment.

  • AnonymousJune 29, 2012 Reply

    In this highly automated world, process control strategies and tactics are critical if the "chartists" are to survive.

    High speed manufacturing requires fast response to signals that seem to say that the process tools are "out of control" or more nuanced by multivariate data, "are not the same machine any more."

    And the responses can be richer and more valuable, more likely to avoid over-control and get the right response type, if the early product pilot rampup was accompanied by great DOE, MSA, and early SPC efforts that resulted in what we used to call FMEA's and Control Plans, and Capability Assessments, and Robust Marathon testing of the equipment. Losing those opportunities, or failing to put the learning in a useful format for longer term actions (usually by people not present during the pilot phase) is key.

    So any templates or automated GUI's that can capture the "known critical parameters" and their "possible failure modes" are great ideas. The trick is to keep up adding new information to those tools, so the simpler they are to CHANGE the more likely they will keep learning!

  • Steve AlbaMarch 14, 2015 Reply

    What if a data is out-of-control but the value is still within specifications? What do you think will be the disposition for the hold lot, is it still passed or reject?

    • billMarch 14, 2015 Reply

      Since the process is out of control, you should try to find the special cause and remove it.  However, the product is stil within specifications – so I do not see a reason to put it on hold.  It does meet your cusotmer specifications.  I would have thought by now customers would require statistical control, but they do not.  So, I would pass the lot as long as it is within specifications.

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