Interval charting schemes for joint monitoring of process mean and variance

Shewhart mean and variance schemes continue to enjoy great popularity among process engineers because they are easy to understand and are the most sensitive in detecting large process shifts. For some processes, for example the screen printing process in memory modules assembly, there is a possibility of the process mean and variance shifting at the same time due to special causes. Thus, instead of studying the joint behavior by looking at the mean and valiance information on two separate charts, it is practical and usually more meaningful to look at the combined mean and variance information on an interval charting scheme. The interval scheme is found to have a similar run length performance to the Shewhart mean and variance schemes and only a single chart needs to be managed. A simple design procedure for the interval scheme that matches the corresponding Shewhart scheme is provided for easy implementation. Also, the interval and Shewhart schemes are compared based on real manufacturing data sets. Copyright (C) 2004 John Wiley Sons, Ltd.