Customer Reviews

Understanding Statistical Process Control

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book starts with a extremely well explained chapter on the philosophy of control charts. This is really the most important part of the book. Other topics about rational subgrouping and myths are also very well covered. The book deals with interesting examples which should be a little bit more up-to-date. Presenting control charts on mm-paper is outdated in this computer era.

This is an excellent cookbook for participants in SPC. It helps you to avoid of miss-using the SPC.

For me, it helps me to prepare training material on SPC easier.

Unfortunately, the theory aspect in this book is not enough for expert usage.

SPC is a widely MISUSED and OVERused term in the manufacturing world. It is amazing how many myths and misunderstandings exist and are accepted as rules of thumb. Understanding Statistical Process Control explains the foundations of Shewhart's control charts in depth, tying up its usage in real world. This is the simplest, most accurate guide for learning and applying SPC. Wheeler carefully separates the facts from fiction. His examples and excercises give reader a chance to see how control charts should be used in real world.
Conclusion: BUY IT

I purchased this book believing that it would give me insight to SPC and more specifically control charts, and as a supplement to text books I currently own by Montgomery. I can say that this book is OK for beginners who have not had any exposure at all to college level SPC or Control Chart classes or books. However, if you already own any college level text book regarding SPC, Quality Control, or Control Charts, this book will be too elementary for you.

It is a really great book about SPC methods. Clearly written, Dr. Wheeler's book explains the dos and don'ts of SPC techniques. I found Dr. Wheeler's style of writing simple, but always reaching SPC target. If you are looking for a sound and understandable information about SPC, read it. It is worthwhile book.

This book is for all practicing professional on SPC and an eye-opener for the novice. It highlights many important topics specially the four state of a process model and shows how the process behaviour chart ( a.k.a control chart)can help in reaching the ideal state. The correct and wrong way of doing the calculation for the establishment of the control limits is also discussed and clarified and much more . This is a must to have for all who wants to go through their personal path to SPC . Buy this Book !

The book is well written, the examples illustrate the concepts in a nice way. Readers new to Statistics ought to read about basic concepts of Statistics from other texts that deal with the subject on a simpler level, then read this book.

Certain topics are not included although they are relevant in today's business context - for instance, Lean, and Mass Customization have resulted in many processes being changed around to small lot sizes. This requires the use of Short Run SPC, and it is covered in a separate book.

I keep the book handy as a ready reference, and also recommend it on a regular basis.

I bought this for a Master's level course in SPC. I'm finished with chapter 4 at this point and have found it to be easy to understand for a non-statistician. There are some minor proofreading things which are a bit of a distraction - such as in exercise 4.2 c, it refers to a figure 4.21, and no such named figure exists.

So far, I like it. The examples are good and there are some partial answers to the exercises at the end of each chapter.

Each chapter has a summary. There is an index, and many helpful tables in the Appendices. The writing style seems heavily opinionated, on certain topics.

It did seem a bit odd that in chapter 4 there were two examples of how to do charts and formulations wrong. I understand why this is important, especially if these wrong ways are common. However in practice it seems that the more we do something - the more we will tend to do it that way in the future. The exercises at the end of this chapter request you calculate these both the right and wrong way. I believe it would be better to repeat, reinforce, and practice only the right way.

It is a bit hard to get used to the change in terminology - from out of control to unpredictable.

This text seems to have been designed primarily for accessibility, and it has certainly achieved that. It pretty much explains in simple terms (anything above high school math) everything you need to create and use SPC and other control charts. This was more basic than what I was shooting for, but it's easy to skim through parts. I imagine the target audience was lower-middle management or factory line workers.

More in-depth information and proofs are supplied for some aspects, though it is stressed that these methods have been found useful empirically and that was their primary aim, and although a good bit of theory informed their design, they aren't necessarily theoretically rigorous. In other words, they are pragmatic rather than academic.

The techniques are certainly useful. I'm starting to apply them for software.

More than a cookbook, this text provides an excellent reference on SPC. It clears away many myths and gives useful specific case studies. The book also reviews many mistakes commonly made with control charts and SPC techniques