OPMA 601 (Winter 2023)
Operations Management
Solutions to Practice Problem Set 4
1. Agree or disagree with the following statement:
If the process average is in control, then the process range must also be in control.
Circle One: AGREE DISAGREE
Explain:
Mean charts and range charts are not substitutes – they complement one another,
one detecting shifts in process average, the other detecting shifts in process
dispersion.
2. Suppose the mean and the standard deviation of a process are fixed. As the sample
size increases, the upper control limit for the process should (choose your position and
explain in less than 3 sentences):
i. Decrease
ii. Increase
iii. Remain the same
Because the standard deviation decreases as sample size increase.
3. The upper and lower limits for diving ring diameters made by John's Swimming Co.
are 40 and 39 cm., respectively. John took 11 samples with the following average
diameters (39, 39.1, 39.2, 39.3, 39.4, 39.5 39.6, 39.7, 39.8, 39.9, 40). Is the process in
control? What would be your recommendation to the company?
Process appears to be in control but an investigation may be required. There is a
distinguishable pattern to the sample means (increasing trend).
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4. Which of the following is NOT an internal “warning sign” that the business processes
at your organization may need improvement?
a) Customer Complaints
b) Idle Staff / Equipment
c) High Rework / Scrap
d) Employee Frustration
e) Excessive Delays / Inventory
5. The self-destructing syringe example we covered in class in an example of
a) A quality “prevention” approach
b) A quality “alarm”
c) A quality “investigation” tool
d) A quality “failsafe”
e) Both a. and d.
6. A pizza business would like to use a control chart to monitor how many pizzas are
being delivered damaged. What type of control chart(s) should be used?
a) p-chart
b) x-chart
c) r-chart
d) x-chart & r-chart
7. Jars of pickles are sampled and weighed. Sample measures are plotted on control
charts. The ideal weight should be precisely 11 oz. Which type of chart(s) would you
recommend?
a) p-chart
b) x-chart
c) r-chart
d) x-chart & r-chart
e) p-chart & r-chart
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8. If 1 million passengers pass through the St. Louis Airport with checked baggage each
month, a successful Six Sigma program for baggage handling would result in how
many passengers with misplaced luggage?
a) 3.4
b) 6.0
c) 34
d) 2700
e) 6 times the monthly standard deviation of passengers
9. Natural variations:
a) affect almost every production process.
b) are the many sources of variation that occur when a process is under control.
c) when grouped, form a pattern, or distribution.
d) are tolerated, within limits, when a process is under control.
e) All of the above are true.
10. A consultant has been brought in to a manufacturing plant to help apply Six Sigma
principles. Her first task is to work on the production of rubber balls. The upper and
lower spec limits are 21 and 19 cm, respectively. The consultant takes ten samples of
size five and computes the sample standard deviation to be 0.7 cm and the sample
mean to be 19.89 cm. Compute the capability index for the process. Give the
consultant advice on what to do with the process based on your findings.
Cpk = min [(21 - 19.89)/(3 ∗ _.7), (19.89 - 19)/(3 ∗ _.7)] = .424
The very low capability metrics mean the process is not capable. The variability
must be reduced.
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11. At your first job out of college you have been assigned to the production of bottled 20
oz. soda. The process has upper and lower spec limits of 20.5 and 19.5 oz,
respectively, with a mean of 19.8 oz and standard deviation of .1 oz. Your manager
has requested the process produce no more than 3.4 defects per 1 million bottles
produced. Calculate Cpk and then determine if the process is capable according to the
manager's standard.
Cpk = minimum [(20.5 - 19.8)/(3 ∗ _.1),(19.8 - .5)/(3 ∗ _.1)] = 1.0 oz
The process is capable according to the typical 3-sigma standard of needing a
Cpk value ≥ 1; however, it is not capable according to the manager's six-sigma
standard because Cpk is less than the 2.0 required for under 3.4 defects per
million.
12. The specifications for a manifold gasket that installs between two engine parts calls
for a thickness of 2.500 mm ± .020 mm. The standard deviation of the process is
estimated to be 0.004 mm. The process is currently operating at a mean thickness of
2.50 mm.
a) What are the upper and lower specification limits for this product?
b) What is the Cp for this process?
c) About what percent of all units of this gasket will meet specifications? Does
this meet the technical definition of Six Sigma?
d) If the process mean were to drift from its setting of 2.500 mm to a new mean of
2.497, would the process still be capable?
(a) LSL = 2.48 mm, USL = 2.52 mm.
(b) Cp = (2.52 - 2.48)/(6 ∗ _0.004) = 1.67.
(c) Each specification limit lies 5 standard deviations from the centerline, so
practically 100 percent of units will meet specifications. However, this
percentage is not quite as high as Six Sigma would call for.
(d) The Cpk index is now relevant, and its value is the lesser of 1.917 and
1.417. The process is still capable.
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13. A manager wishes to build a 3-sigma range chart for process control. The sample size
is five, the mean of sample means is 16.01, and the average range is 5.3. What are the
UCL and LCL, respectively, for this range chart?
From the table, the appropriate value of D3 is 0, and D4 is 2.11 for n=5. UCL and
LCL are 11.2 and 0.
14. A canned food manufacturing plant randomly selects 4 cans as a sample each week
over a 5-week period in order to determine if the cans have equal weights. The data
(in oz.) collected is shown below:
1 2 3 4
1 27 19 21 16
2 25 21 20 15
WEEK 3 19 16 25 10
4 17 25 14 25
5 25 17 25 17
Based on the data in the above table, construct 3- control limits for the range chart
and determine whether the process is in control based on the range chart.
1 2 3 4 Range
1 27 19 21 16 11
2 25 21 20 15 10
3 19 16 25 10 15
WEEK 4 17 25 14 25 11
5 25 17 25 17 8
R =11
R = 11, n = 4
3-σ Control Limits on the Range:
UCL = D4 R = 2.28*11 = 25.08
LCL = D3 R = 0*11 = 0
Hence, the process is in control since all ranges are within the limits.
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15. Four samples of 3 observations each have been taken from a process, with actual
measurements (in cm) shown below. Construct 3-sigma control limits for the mean
and range charts.
Sample: 1 2 3 4
12.3 11.9 12.0 12.1
12.2 12.2 12.2 11.8
12.1 12.2 11.8 11.8
Suppose that after constructing the control limits, 2 more samples are taken with the
following results:
Sample Measurements (cm)
1 12.2 12.4 12.6
2 12.3 12.4 12.2
Based on these samples, determine if corrective action is needed.
Sample 1 - mean = 12.4 (out of control), range = 0.4
Sample 2 - mean = 12.3, range = 0.2
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16. The Blue Bob Cab Company collects records on the number of complaints received
for every 100 trips taken. Over 9 sets of 100 trips, the calls from irate passengers
were 3, 0, 8, 9, 6, 7, 4, 9, and 8 for a total of 54 complaints. What are the appropriate
upper and lower control limits using z = 4 (4 standard deviations apart)? Select the
best answer.
a) UCL = 0.132, LCL = -0.012
b) UCL = 0.156, LCL = -0.036
c) UCL = 0.156, LCL = -0.012
d) UCL = 0.156, LCL = 0.000
e) UCL = 0.156, LCL = 0.036
n= 100
p-bar = 54 / 9*100 = 0.06
Sp = 0.024
UCLp-bar = p-bar + z (Sp) = 0.06 + 4*0.024 =0 .156
LCLp-bar = p-bar - z (Sp) = 0.06 - 4*0.024 = -(0.036) --> zero
Since it doesn’t make sense to have a negative number of complaints, the LCL is
effectively zero. The correct answer is (d).
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17. You are the newly appointed assistant administrator at a local hospital, and your first
project is to investigate the quality of the patient meals put out by the food-service
department. You conducted a 10-day survey by submitting a simple questionnaire to
the 400 patients with each meal, asking that they simply check off that the meal was
either satisfactory or unsatisfactory. For simplicity in this problem, assume that the
response was 1,000 returned questionnaires from the 1,200 meals each day. The
results are as follows:
Construct a p-chart based on the questionnaire results, using a confidence interval of
95.5 percent, which is two standard deviations. What comments can you make about
the process?
The chart indicates that the process is out of control. The administrator should
investigate the quality of the patient meals.
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USE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION TO ANSWER THE NEXT THREE
QUESTIONS:
A machine operation requires close tolerances on a certain part for automobile engines.
The quality control procedure (using z = 3) is to take a sample of size four and measure
each of the parts. X-double-bar = 3.0 and R-bar = 0.0015
Sample 1 2 3 4 5
X 3.0005 2.9904 3.0007 3.0006 3.0008
R 0.0024 0.0031 0.0010 0.0040 0.0010
18. On the basis of past samples of size four, the upper and lower control limits (UCL
and LCL) for the chart are:
a) UCL = 3.0011, LCL = 2.9989
b) UCL = 3.0034, LCL = 2.9966
c) UCL = 3.0034, LCL = 2.9989
d) UCL = 3.0011, LCL = 2.9966
Grand mean (x-double bar) = 3.0
Average range (R-bar) = 0.0015
n=4
UCLx-bar = (x-double bar) + A2 (R-bar) = 3.0 + .73*(0.0015) = 3.0011
LCLx-bar = (x-double bar) - A2 (R-bar) = 3.0 - .73*(0.0015) = 2.9989
The correct answer is (a).
19. Given the five samples, how many are out of control?
a) 0
b) 1
c) 2
d) 3
e) 4
For a process to be in control both the x-bar and R values must fall within the
control limits. Therefore we must calculate the control limits for the R chart and
use those along with the control limits on x-bar from above to properly answer
this question.
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UCLR = D4 * R-bar = 2.28 * 0.0015 = 0.00342
LCLR = D3 * R-bar = 0 * 0.0015 = 0.0
Sample 2 --> x-bar is out of control, it is less than the LCL
Sample 4 --> R is greater than the UCL
Therefore, the answer is (c): both sample 2 & sample 4 are out of control.
20. Given the above samples, is the process running outside of the specification limits?
a) yes, because the process is out of control.
b) no, because the process is in control.
c) cannot be determined with the given information.
d) can be determined if the individual sample points from the samples are known.
Specification limits (from an external source such as a government agency) are
not given or known. Thus, there is not enough information to answer this
question (i.e. (c) is correct).
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