What is the Taguchi Method of Quality Control?

Ans) The Taguchi Method of quality control is an approach to engineering that emphasizes the roles
of research and development, product design and product development in reducing the occurrence of
defects and failures in products. The Taguchi Method considers design to be more important than the
manufacturing process in quality control and tries to eliminate variances in production before they
can occur.

Quality control can be divided into two main activities: on-line and off-line methods.

Off-line refers to the activities in the design phase of development before the product is released to
manufacturing. On-line quality control relates to the activities that occur on the manufacturing line.
On-line Methods
A review of the literature indicates that on-line quality control methods began in 1916, when C. N.
Frazee of Bell Telephone Laboratories developed the operating characteristic (OC) curve for
inspection problems. It was then necessary to have measures of the probability of acceptance for
various sampling plans in popular use. The curves and tables developed for this purpose by Thorndike
and Molina are still used today in sampling inspection and reliability engineering.
off-line methods
off-line method of quality control is newer than the on-line techniques. The literature indicates that it
was not until the early 1950s that reliability and other off-line methods were recognized for their
applicability to quality control. In the early 1950s the Department of Défense and the electronics
industry commissioned a task force called the Advisory Group on Reliability of Electronic Equipment
(AGREE). The AGREE report recommended that a special discipline be imposed during the
development phases to ensure that designs would be reliable. To be included in the discipline was
design analysis techniques and formal reliability demonstration testing. Recent developments in
reliability have tended to reduce the emphasis on predicting and demonstrating reliability. More
emphasis is being placed on design analysis and on testing to discover potential weaknesses so that
improvements could be made early in the development cycle. This approach has long been used by
the best of the commercial industries, and the purchasers and developers of large systems. In addition
to reliability studies, the off-line quality control methods cornmon in the U.S. include 9
maintainability, sensitivity analysis, and prototype testing. Maintainability is concerned with
implementing principles basic to future equipment repair while the equipment is being designed,
developed, or fabricated. Sensitivity analysis deals with making products robust to operating and
environmental variation. Prototype testing is done to insure optimum design, layout, operation, and/or
safety.
2. Explain briefly about Taguchi loss function?
Ans) Developed by Genichi Taguchi, it is a graphical representation of how an increase
in variation within specification limits leads to an exponential increase in customer dissatisfaction.
The common thinking around specification limits is that the customer is satisfied as long as
the variation stays within the specification limits (Figure 5). If the variation exceeds the limits, then
the customer immediately feels dissatisfied. The specification limits divide satisfaction from
dissatisfaction. For example, if the lower limit is 10, and the upper limit is 20, then a measurement of
19.9 will lead to customer satisfaction, while a measurement of 20.1 will lead to customer
dissatisfaction.

However, Taguchi states that any variation away from the nominal (target) performance will begin to
incur customer dissatisfaction. As the variation increases, the customer will gradually (exponentially)
become dissatisfied. In the previous example, if the measurement is 19.9, the customer will be
dissatisfied more than a measurement of 19.8. If the measurement is 20.1, the customer will be slightly
more dissatisfied than the measurement of 19.9. Taguchi states that the specification limits do not
cleanly separate satisfaction levels for the customer. Any variation away from the nominal (value of
15 in the example above) will start to incur customer dissatisfaction. The quality does not suddenly
plummet once the limits are exceeded, rather it is a gradual degradation as the measurements get
closer to the limits. The goal of a company should be to achieve the target performance with
minimal variation. That will minimize the customer dissatisfaction.

A real-life example of the Taguchi Loss Function would be the quality of food compared to
expiration dates. If you purchase an orange at the supermarket, there is a certain date that is ideal to
eat it. That would be the target date. There will also be limits for when to eat the orange (within three
days of the target date, Day 2 to Day 8). For this example, Day 5 represents the target date to eat the
orange. That is when the orange will taste the best (customer satisfaction). You purchase the orange
on Day 1, but if you eat the orange you will be very dissatisfied, as it is not ready to eat. This would
fall below the lower limit. On Day 3 it would be acceptable to eat, but you are still dissatisfied because
it doesn’t taste as good as eating on the target date. If you wait for Day 5, you will be satisfied, because
it is eaten on the ideal date. If you wait until Day 7, you will be slightly dissatisfied, because it is one
day past the ideal date, but it will still be within the limits provided by the supermarket. If you wait
until Day 9, you will be very dissatisfied, as it will be too far past the ideal date. You are slightly
dissatisfied from Day 2 through 4, and from Day 6 through 8, even though technically you are within
the limits provided by the supermarket. The least amount of dissatisfaction occurs on the target date,
and each day removed from the target date incurs slightly more dissatisfaction. Contrary to most
discussions around specification limits, you are NOT completely satisfied from Days 2 through 8, and
only dissatisfied on Day 1 and 9.
3. Explain the properties of orthogonal array?

Definition

Taguchi has envisaged a new method of conducting the design of experiments which are based on
well-defined guidelines. This method uses a special set of arrays called orthogonal arrays. These
standard arrays stipulate the way of conducting the minimal number of experiments which could give
the full information of all the factors that affect the performance parameter. The crux of the orthogonal
array’s method lies in choosing the level combinations of the input design variables for each
experiment.

orthogonal array

While there are many standard orthogonal arrays available, each of the arrays is meant for a specific
number of independent design variables and levels.

For example, if one wants to conduct an experiment to understand the influence of 4 different
independent variables with each variable having 3 set values (level values), then an L9 orthogonal
array might be the right choice. The L9 orthogonal array is meant for understanding the effect of 4
independent factors each having 3 factor level values. This array assumes that there is no interaction
between any two factors. While in many cases, no interaction model assumption is valid, there are
some cases where there is a clear evidence of interaction. A typical case of interaction would be the
interaction between the material properties and temperature.

The Table 2.1 shows an L9 orthogonal array. There are totally 9 experiments to be conducted and each
experiment is based on the combination of level values as shown in the table. For example, the third
experiment is conducted by keeping the independent design variable 1 at level 1, variable 2 at level 3,
variable 3 at level 3, and variable 4 at level 3.
Properties of an orthogonal array

The orthogonal arrays have the following special properties that reduces the number of experiments
to be conducted.

1. The vertical column under each independent variables of the above table has a special
combination of level settings. All the level settings appear an equal number of times. For L9
array under variable 4, level 1, level 2 and level 3 appears thrice. This is called the balancing
property of orthogonal arrays.
2. All the level values of independent variables are used for conducting the experiments.
3. The sequence of level values for conducting the experiments shall not be changed. This means
one cannot conduct experiment 1 with variable 1, level 2 setup and experiment 4 with variable
1, level 1 setup. The reason for this is that the array of each factor columns is mutually
orthogonal to any other column of level values. The inner product of vectors corresponding to
weights is zero. If the above 3 levels are normalized between -1 and 1, then the weighing
factors for level 1, level 2, level 3 are -1, 0, 1 respectively. Hence the inner product of weighing
factors of independent variable 1 and independent variable 3 would be (-1 * -1+-1*0+-1*1)
+(0*0+0*1+0*-1) +(1*0+1*1+1*-1) =0