Teaching Variation Reduction Using a Virtual Manufacturing Environment

Stefan H. Steiner Stefan Steiner is Associate Professor, Business and Industrial Statistics Research Group, Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, N2L 3G1 Canada . Jock MacKay is Associate Professor, Business and Industrial Statistics Research Group, Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, N2L 3G1 Canada . This work was partially supported by the University of Waterloo Learning Initiatives Fund. The authors thank Xiuran (Mimi) Xia who did much of the initial programming in the development of the web environment. The authors thank the editor, an associate editor, and the referees, whose comments and suggestions substantially improved this article.

R. Jock MacKay Stefan Steiner is Associate Professor, Business and Industrial Statistics Research Group, Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, N2L 3G1 Canada . Jock MacKay is Associate Professor, Business and Industrial Statistics Research Group, Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, N2L 3G1 Canada . This work was partially supported by the University of Waterloo Learning Initiatives Fund. The authors thank Xiuran (Mimi) Xia who did much of the initial programming in the development of the web environment. The authors thank the editor, an associate editor, and the referees, whose comments and suggestions substantially improved this article.

Abstract

This article describes the virtual manufacturing environment Watfactory (freely available at http://services03.student.math.uwaterloo.ca:8080/~stat435/login.htm) and discusses its use in teaching process improvement. Watfactory provides a rich and realistic simulation of a manufacturing process and is accessed through a website requiring no software other than a Web browser. With Watfactory, students select, plan, and analyze the data from a sequence of empirical investigations of many different types, with the ultimate goal of reducing variation in the process output. We have found that using Watfactory addresses many shortcomings in traditional teaching methods for both undergraduate and industrial short courses.

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Teaching Variation Reduction Using a Virtual Manufacturing Environment

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Teaching Variation Reduction Using a Virtual Manufacturing Environment

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