Quality Through Design

This volume provides a clear exposition of the quality-control techniques credited with contributing greatly to Japan's industrial success. Pioneered by Taguchi, these methods combine off-line product/process optimization and quality cost containment with appropriate statistical techniques for experimental design and analysis. The idea is to build quality into both the product and into the manufacturing process at a pre-production stage--at the point of product development and process design. The book also describes new developments in areas such as variance estimation, tolerance design, data transformation, and response surface experimentation. Many worked examples and case histories are included, making the work an ideal manual for design engineers, quality technologists and managers, and for professional statisticians and students. The book offers a rare source of information that brings together proven Japanese planning approaches with statistical theory.