1. Six Sigma Quality Engineering
Team Project
A Paper Helicopter Experiment

2. Helicopter Paper Experiment (See book page 539)
Requirements –
5x5 (5 space per inch) Quad Pad per team
1 preferably 2 scissors per team
1 stopwatch per team
Purpose -
To create, conduct, analyze, and draw conclusions in a 27-4 fractional factorial DOE.
Problem
Currently, the factors that keep a Helicopter aloft as long as possible are not well understood
Objective
To identify the factors and their respective effects that impact the length of time the Helicopter stays aloft
Metric
Seconds aloft
Start time – When the bottom of the helicopter is dropped from the top of the Flip Chart
Stop time – When the bottom of the helicopter touches the ground

3. Helicopter Paper Experiment
Procedure
Create the Baseline Helicopter
Using the Quad paper supplied, create a baseline Helicopter as shown below in the picture to the left. Shown below right is an example schematic to create the baseline Helicopter. Use the grids on the Quad paper as a means to quantify the length of the cuts and folds. Your team can make any size Baseline Helicopter you desire
Cuts are made on the solid lines
Folds are made on the dotted lines

4. Helicopter Paper Experiment
Procedure (cont’d)
Baseline Capability –
Using the top of the flip chart as a constant measure of height, drop the baseline helicopter 50 times and determine the capability of this design. Use 1.75 sec as a lower specification limit. The time will be measured from using the Metric definition.
DoE -
Work with your team to determine 7 factors that you want to test in a 27-4
fractional factorial. Name your 7 Factors and quantify them based on the number of grids. The grid size will be the smallest change you can make to this process. The factors and levels you select can be anything you want them to be, greater or smaller than your current baseline, or all of them greater than, or smaller than the baseline.
Run three replicates of this DOE. (Technically, you would have to make a new helicopter for each replicate, for this DOE make an helicopter for each run of the single replicate and drop them in random order).
Analyze the results of the DOE and determine an optimal set of conditions that provides improved capability.Using the optimal set of conditions, create an helicopter, drop 50 times and measure the improved capability

5. Helicopter Paper Experiment Report Out
Project Charter: Refer to pages 99 & 100 in book.
Metrics: Primary & Secondary.
SIPOC: Identify Supplier Inputs Process Output Customer.
Process Map: Develop a process map of your Helicopter Paper Experiment and identify the X’s, Y’s, and all possible noise variables (understanding and attempting to control noise variables will be critical in this exercise).
Gage R&R: Repeatability & Reproducibility.
Capability Study: Cp & Cpk.
C&E Diagram: Fishbone Diagram
C&E Matrix: FMEA

6. Helicopter Paper Experiment Report Out
DOE: Design Of Experiment:
Output variable(s)
Input variables
Study design
Procedures
Results and Data analysis
Conclusions
Capability Study of improved process: Cp & Cpk.
Control Phase: X-bar and R Control Chart.
Final Report: Project Conclusions.