Asymmetric Control Limits for Weighted-Variance Mean Control Chart with Different Scale Estimators under Weibull Distributed Process

Abstract

Shewhart charts are the most commonly utilised control charts for process monitoring in industries with the assumption that the underlying distribution of the quality characteristic is normal. However, this assumption may not always hold true in practice. In this paper, the weighted-variance mean charts are developed and their population standard deviation is estimated using the three subgroup scale estimators, namely the standard deviation, median absolute deviation and standard deviation of trimmed mean for monitoring Weibull distributed data with different coefficients of skewness. This study aims to compare the out-of-control average run length of these charts with the pre-determined fixed value of the in-control ARL in terms of different scale estimators, coefficients of skewness and sample sizes via extensive simulation studies. The results indicate that as the coefficients of skewness increase, the charts tend to detect the out-of-control signal more rapidly under identical magnitude of shift. Meanwhile, as the size of the shift increases under the same coefficient of skewness, the proposed charts are able to locate the shifts quicker and the similar scenarios arise as a sample size raised from 5 to 10. A real data set from survival analysis domain which, possessing Weibull distribution, was to demonstrate the usefulness and applicability of the proposed chart in practice.

Keywords

• weighted-variance
• asymmetric control limits
• mean chart
• Weibull distribution
• scale estimator
• average run length