Proper control chart selection is critical to realizing the benefits of Statistical Process Control. Many factors should be considered when choosing a control chart for a given application. These include:
- The type of data being charted (continuous or attribute)
- The required sensitivity (size of the change to be detected) of the chart
- Whether the chart includes data from multiple locations or not
- The ease and cost of sampling
- Production volumes
- Multiple measurements on the same unit (e.g. diameter in 3 places)
- Units produced during the same cycle from different cavities, machining locations, filling heads etc.