Optimization of product and process design for quality and cost

Robust product and process design is an important technique for achieving high quality at low cost. It involves making the product's function much less sensitive to various sources of noise such as manufacturing variation, environmental variation and deterioration. This is a problem in optimization involving minimization of the mean square loss resulting from the deviation of the product's function from its target. Here we show that the optimization can be carried out in two steps: first maximize a quantity called signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) and then bring the performance on target by special adjustment parameters. The two-step procedure works for a wide variety of product functions and makes the optimization process more efficient and practical compared to the direct minimization of the quadratic loss function.     

Optimization strategies in robust engineering design and computer-aided design

This paper reviews the fundamental ideas involved in robust engineering design (RED), and how they relate to computer-aided design. There are several areas of RED that may be successfully resolved by the use of statistical methods or ideas. This paper gives a general overview of several popular statistical strategies in RED and discusses how these strategies approach the statistical problems involved.     

Optimization of process parameters for ultrasonic drilling of advanced engineering ceramics using the Taguchi approach

The effect of process parameters on the cutting ratio (ratio of material removal rate to tool wear rate) for ultrasonic drilling of alumina-based ceramics using silicon carbide abrasive was studied. The parameters considered were workpiece material, tool material, grit size of the abrasive, power rating, and slurry concentration. Taguchi’s optimization approach was used to obtain the optimal parameters. The significant parameters were identified and their effects on cutting ratio were studied. The results obtained were validated by conducting confirmation experiments.     

A review of the ‘taguchi methods’ for off-line quality control

The Taguchi methods have recently become popular in the U.S.A following a realization of their importance in Japanese quality design. This review is an initial attempt to extract the important ideas while drawing on the ‘Western’ experience with response surface methodology and experimental design.     

Gating System Design for a Magnesium Alloy Casting

The gating system of a cylindrical magnesium casting has been designed by using multiple objective optimiza- tion and Taguchi method.Mold filling and solidification processes were simulated by using MAGMASOFT（？）. The simulation results indicate that the gating system design has a significant effect on the quality of magne- sium castings.In an effort to obtain the optimal design of gating system,the signal-to-noise （S/N） ratio was used to analyze the effect of various gating designs on cavity filling and casting quality by using a weighting method based on the design of an orthogonal array.Four gating system parameters,namely,ingate height, ingate width,runner height,runner width,were optimized with a consideration of multiple objective criteria including filling velocity,shrinkage porosity and product yield.     

Robust design for multiple dynamic quality characteristics using data envelopment analysis

The Taguchi method is extensively adopted in various industries to continuously improve product design in response to customer requirements. The dynamic system of the Taguchi method is frequently implemented to design products with flexible applications. However, Taguchi's dynamic system can be employed only for individual quality characteristic, and the relationship between the quality characteristic and the signal factor is assumed to be linear. Because of these restrictions, Taguchi's dynamic system is ineffective for multiple quality characteristics or when the quality characteristic has a nonlinear relationship with the signal factor. This study describes a novel procedure for optimizing a dynamic system based on data envelopment analysis. The proposed procedure overcomes the limitations of Taguchi's dynamic system. Two cases are analyzed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed procedure. The results show that the proposed procedure can enhance multiple dynamic quality characteristics. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Robust product development for multiple quality characteristics using computer experiments and an optimization technique

Conventional parameter or tolerance designs focus on developing exact methods to minimize quality loss or manufacturing cost. The inherent assumption is that the response functions which represent the link between controllable variables and response values of quality characteristics are known before a design is developed. Moreover, parameter and tolerance values are assumed to be independent controllable variables in previous works; namely, they are determined separately in design activities. Currently, advanced computer software, such as computer-aided engineering, can help engineers to handle design problems with unknown response functions, at the stage of product design and process planning. Therefore, in this study, the software ANSYS was employed to obtain simulation data which represent the response values of quality characteristics. These response values will be used to fit a set of response functions for later analysis. However, previous works in computer simulation for design and planning usually lack consideration of the noise impact from an external design system. To approximate a realistic design environment, various levels of controllable variables, in conjunction with artificial noises created from uncontrollable variables, are used to generate simulated data for statistical analysis via Response Surface Methodology (RSM). Then, an optimization technique, such as mathematical programming, is adopted to integrate these response functions into one formulation so that optimal parameter and tolerance values are concurrently determined, with multiple quality characteristics taken into consideration. A bike-frame design was used to demonstrate the presented approach, followed by multiple quality characteristics of interest: material cost, bike-frame weight, structure reliability, and rigidity dependability. The goal is to minimize material cost and bike frame weight and to maximize structure reliability and rigidity dependability. This approach is useful for solving any complex design problems in the early stages, while providing enhanced functionality, quality, economic benefits, and a shorter design cycle.     

Selection of Welding Process Parameters for the Optimum Butt-Joint Strength of an Aluminum Alloy

In this paper, the selection of welding process parameters for obtaining the optimum weld butt-joint ultimate tensile strength (UTS) of aluminum alloy (6061-T6) is presented. Considering weld-joint UTS as the quality characteristic in the selection of process parameters, the Taguchi method is used to analyze the effect of each individual process parameter and of their interaction and then to determine process parameters for the optimum weld-joint UTS. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) technique is applied to investigate which welding process parameter has significant effect on the weld-joint UTS. Experimental results are provided to illustrate the proposed approach.     

Selection of Welding Process Parameters for the Optimum Butt-Joint Strength of an Aluminum Alloy

In this paper, the selection of welding process parameters for obtaining the optimum weld butt-joint ultimate tensile strength (UTS) of aluminum alloy (6061-T6) is presented. Considering weld-joint UTS as the quality characteristic in the selection of process parameters, the Taguchi method is used to analyze the effect of each individual process parameter and of their interaction and then to determine process parameters for the optimum weld-joint UTS. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) technique is applied to investigate which welding process parameter has significant effect on the weld-joint UTS. Experimental results are provided to illustrate the proposed approach.     

A comparison of deterministic and statistical sampling techniques for quality analysis of integrated circuits

There has been a great amount of publicity about Taguchi methods which employ deterministic sampling techniques for robust design. Also given wide exposition in the literature is tolerance design which achieves similar objectives but employs random sampling techniques. The question arises as to which approach—random or deterministic—is more suitable for robust design of integrated circuits. Robust design is a two-step process and quality analysis—the first step—involves the estimation of ‘quality factors’, which measure the effect of noise on the quality of system performance. This paper concentrates on the quality analysis of integrated circuits. A comparison is made between the deterministic sampling technique based on Taguchi's orthogonal arrays and the random sampling technique based on the Monte Carlo method, the objective being to determine which of the two gives more reliable (i.e. more consistent) estimates of quality factors. Results obtained indicated that the Monte Carlo method gave estimates of quality which were at least 40 per cent more consistent than orthogonal arrays. The accuracy of prediction of quality by Taguchi's orthogonal arrays is strongly affected by the choice of parameter quantization levels—a disadvantage—since there is a very large number (theoretically infinite) of choices of quantization levels for each parameter of an integrated circuit. The cost of the Monte Carlo method is independent of the dimensionality (number of designable parameters), being governed only by the confidence levels required for quality factors, whereas the size of orthogonal array required for a given problem is partly dependent on the number of circuit parameters. Two integrated circuits—a 7-parameter CMOS voltage reference and a 20-parameter bipolar operational amplifier—were employed in the investigation. Quality factors of interest included performance variability, acceptability (relative to customer specifications) and deviation from target.     

Off-line quality control via yield constrained variability minimization in circuit design

During the lifetime of any system, e.g. an electronic circuit, sources of variation of parameters include fabrication, operational and environmental (FOE) variables. Since these sources of variation are not under designer control, one important objective at the product design stage is to reduce rather than control their influence. The aim of this paper is to present a methodology whereby settings of system parameters which make product performance less sensitive to FOE variations are identified. By so doing, reliability (consistency of acceptable performance), and hence quality, is enhanced. The approach taken is to minimize performance variability subject to a constraint on yield. This objective ensures consistency of performance while the constraint ensures acceptability of performance. Multiple performances are handled via a weighted sum objective. The Monte Carlo approach ensures that any parameter probability density function is handled and that computational cost does not increase with system dimensionality. The effectiveness of the technique is illustrated via a practical system example—an electronic circuit having 11 design parameters.     

Defect engineering of photocatalysts for solar-driven conversion of CO2 into valuable fuels

Photoreduction of CO₂ into valuable fuels is a clean and sustainable way to mitigate the energy crisis and environmental problems. Factors limiting the efficiency of CO₂ photoreduction include narrow-band light absorption, poor charge carrier separation and transport, and sluggish activation/reaction of CO₂ on the surface of photocatalyst. In recent years, defect engineering of photocatalysts emerges as an effective method to improve their efficiency in the photocatalytic conversion of CO₂ into useful fuels. This review is focused on discussing how structural defects can be used to modulate the electronic structure of the photocatalysts and activate the inert CO₂ molecules. Special emphasis is placed on the important impact of defects on the charge carrier dynamics of the photocatalysts. Our discussions cover a variety of defective semiconductors, including metal oxides, metal sulfides, and two dimensional materials. In addition, the challenges and prospects of defect engineering in photoreduction of CO₂ are also analyzed. This review aims to provide useful information about the fundamental principles of photoreduction of CO₂ and guidance on the design and preparation of defective photocatalysts.     

A Statistical Framework for Improved Automatic Flaw Detection in Nondestructive Evaluation Images

Nondestructive evaluation (NDE) techniques are widely used to detect flaws in critical components of systems like aircraft engines, nuclear power plants, and oil pipelines to prevent catastrophic events. Many modern NDE systems generate image data. In some applications, an experienced inspector performs the tedious task of visually examining every image to provide accurate conclusions about the existence of flaws. This approach is labor-intensive and can cause misses due to operator ennui. Automated evaluation methods seek to eliminate human-factors variability and improve throughput. Simple methods based on peak amplitude in an image are sometimes employed and a trained-operator-controlled refinement that uses a dynamic threshold based on signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) has also been implemented. We develop an automated and optimized detection procedure that mimics these operations. The primary goal of our methodology is to reduce the number of images requiring expert visual evaluation by filtering out images that are overwhelmingly definitive on the existence or absence of a flaw. We use an appropriate model for the observed values of the SNR-detection criterion to estimate the probability of detection. Our methodology outperforms current methods in terms of its ability to detect flaws. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.     

MOORA-based Taguchi optimisation for improving product or process quality

In this study a multi-objective optimisation on the basis of ratio analysis (MOORA)-based Taguchi application is used to solve multi-response optimisation problems. In this application, the MOORA method is integrated with the Taguchi method to convert the multi-response problem into a single-response problem. Four examples are considered in this paper for illustrative purposes. The MOORA-based Taguchi method is simple and robust compared to the other MADM methods, such as TOPSIS, VIKOR and GRA. The proposed model reduces the time associated with the amount of calculation steps significantly. We found that solution results of the MOORA-based Taguchi application and other hybrid models in the literature were not significantly different. The MOORA-based Taguchi application offers also a new tool in the optimisation of Taguchi’s multi response problem.     

制造质量记录信息管理系统的总体设计与开发

本文首先论述了质量记录在计算机辅助质量管理（ＣＡＱＭＳ）中的作用及地位，随后阐述制造质量记录信息管理系统的总体设计方案，以上工作在计算机集成制造系统（ＣＩＭＳ）应用中将得到体现。     

Determination of dynamic crack resistance of ductile cast iron using the compliance ratio key curve method

The compliance ratio method is an analytical approach for instantaneous crack length determination in dynamic single-specimen J-R curve testing of ferritic ductile cast iron (DCI). Comparison testing at room temperature and −40 °C was applied to PCVN and SE(B)15 specimens to examine their performance and suitability for the dynamic key curve method for DCI. An experimental reference database of dynamic crack resistance curves was set up by low-blow multiple-specimen tests and used to validate the results of the CR method. The influence of test temperature, microstructure, loading rate and specimen geometry on fracture behavior of the tested DCI was investigated in great detail and these parameters were linked to fracture mechanical properties. The results obtained show that the CR method is suited to establish valid dynamic crack resistance curves for both types of specimen. Nevertheless, SE(B)15 specimens are preferred for dynamic J-R curve determination of DCI based on their advantages such as higher accuracy.