Full Factorial Designs

Investigating Power, Number of Replication and Blocking

A manufacturer of large steel augers cleans its product in

the final stages of production just before packaging.
Engineers have identified temperature, time, and
concentration of the cleaning solution as the key input
variables that affect the cleanliness of the augers.
After cleaning each part, experimenter soak the auger in a
solvent. The solvent is then evaporated and the remaining
residue is measured. Engineers want to identify the
process setting that produce the lowest residue.

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Investigating Power, Number of Replication and Blocking

Choosing the Number of Replicates

A meaningful improvement in cleanliness is a

reduction in residue of 5 grams. The standard
deviation of the residue is approximately 2.
Determine the number of replicates needed in a 3-
factor full FD to detect a difference of 5 grams with at
least 80% power.

Data Collection

Only 8 runs can be performed per lot of cleaning solution.

If we choose a design that requires more than 8 runs, we
must add a blocking variable that accounts for the
variation due to the different lots of cleaning solution used
in the experiment

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 Tasks

1. Determine the number of replicates needed in a 3-factor full

FD to detect a difference of 5 units with at least 80% power.
2. Evaluate the power by adding Block to the design
3. Estimate power with 1 replicate
4. Create Factorial Design with Temperature (120, 180), Time
(10, 30 minutes), and Concentration (2, 6) and a blocking
variable (Lot 1, Lot 2)
5. Open Residue.MTW
6. Fit appropriate model to minimize the residue in the cleaning
process
7. Once you obtained final reduced model, check assumptions
using residual plots. We will find an unusual observation
8. Investigate Observation No 10

Tasks

9. We discovered that run no 10 of this experiment was

incorrectly entered into Minitab. The value is
actually 44, not 64.
10. Reanalyze the data using corrected observation until
we find final reduced model
11.Verify assumptions using residual plots
12.Display factorial plots, including cube plot (if
necessary)
13.Display contour and surface plots.
14.Use Predict button

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 Exercise 1

A quality team is studying the effects of oil viscosity,

temperature, and a special additive on engine wear. They
want to find factor settings that minimize engine wear.

The team is looking for the treatment that produces the

least wear. To test all possible interactions, they will run
a full factorial design. Resources allow for at most 20
runs, so they decide to replicate the experiment, using 2
runs for each treatment. To complete testing in half of
the total time, the use two test stands. Because the two
test stands could affect the results, the experiment should
be blocked.

Exercise 1: Instruction
1. Use Power and Sample Size to evaluate the power of this
experiment to detect an effect that is equal to 1 sigma and
an effect that is 1.5 sigma
2. Open EngWearDefine.MTW and define the design.
3. Use Analyze Factorial Design to fit an appropriate model.
4. Evaluate appropriateness of the final model using residual
plots
5. Use factorial plots to determine the best setting
6. Try also to analyze the data using General Linear Model

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 Exercise 2

The two factors that may contribute to the warping

copper plates are temperature and copper content of the
plates

The current design includes 2 factors with 4 levels each.

Therefore, the total number of runs in a complete
replicate is 16. To obtain an estimate of the experimental
error, use 2 replicates. Because of the testing time is
required, only 16 runs can be performed each day. One
replicate is run each day

Instruction
1. Generate a General Full Factorial Design using Temperature
(50, 75, 100, 125) and Copper (40%, 60%, 80%, and 100%) as
factors. Because the data were collected on two separate days,
block on replicates to create a blocking variable.
2. Open the project Warp.MTW to obtain the response data from
the experiment
3. Use Analyze Factorial Design to fit a model
4. Evaluate appropriateness of the final model using residual
plots
5. Use factorial plots to determine the settings that minimize
warping