To ensure proper automation, the integration between machines, software and intelligence must work faster to keep up with evolving customer demands. Effective use of Real-Time Statistical Process Control or SPC tackles this with the right blend of statistics, equipment integration and engineers. As production increases closer to capacity, manufacturers must boost their quality control capabilities while reducing quality costs in potential defects and downtimes.
SPC allows manufacturers to view and evaluate production or operational performance. The biggest issue with traditional methods of SPC analysis was the lag-time between receiving data and transforming it into useful data. Real-time SPC is the next step to further improving process efficiency.
As a method to oversee, manage, and improve a process through statistical analysis, SPC uses data through control charts to highlight and flag manufacturing process inconsistency and predict potential out-of-control scenarios in a piece of equipment/process.
SPC helps quality teams check how variable a process is. For example, control charts (such as Xbar, S, EWMA, U, C, P, NP charts) reveal variance of process output over time. The charts compare this variance against upper and lower limits to see if it fits within certain variation levels. Processes that fall between normal variation levels are considered "in control", and vice versa. SPC also gives insight into what factors impact that performance, as well as the resulting costs.
Real-time SPC also allows manufacturers to detect defects in raw material batches and finished products when these variance measurements are outside of the normal range. Arcstone's SPC toolset comes equipped with configurable and powerful dashboards to provide visual data in real time, while also leveraging our arc.flow Process Orchestration module to receive notifications (email, SMS, Telegram, and other microservices) and can be directly integrated with the equipment through arc.quire to pull in real-time data.
Boost both product and process quality at once with SPC, while minimizing costs. SPC - a lean way to constantly improve manufacturing quality efforts.