first part of this series. The fourth column is the mean square associated with the source of variation.

The mean square is the estimate of the variance for that source of variability (not necessarily by itself) based on the amount of data we have (the degrees of freedom). So, the mean square is the sum of squares divided by the degrees of freedom. We will use the mean square information to estimate the variance of each source of variation this is the key to analyzing the Gage R&R results. The fifth column is the F value. This is the statistic that is calculated to determine if the source of variability is statistically significant. It is based on the ratio of two variances (or mean squares in this case).

The ANOVA Table Results

The data was analyzed using the SPC for Excel software. The results for the ANOVA table are shown below. Source Operator Part Operator by Part Equipment Total df 2 4 8 30 44 SS 1.630 28.909 0.065 1.712 32.317 MS 0.815 7.227 0.008 0.057 F 100.322 889.458 0.142 p Value 0.0000 0.0000 0.9964

Note that there is an additional column in this output the p values. This is the column we want to examine first. If the p value is less than 0.05, it means that the source of variation has a significant impact on the results. As you can see in the table, the operator by part source is not significant. Its p value is 0.9964. Many software packages contain an option to remove the interaction if the p value is above a certain value most often 0.25. In that case, the interaction is rolled into the equipment variation. We will keep it in the calculations here though it has little impact since its mean square is so small. The next column we want to look at is the mean square column. This column is an estimate of the variance due to the source of variation. So, MSOperators = 0.815 MSParts = 7.227 MSOperators*Parts = 0.008 MSEquipment = 0.057 You might be tempted to assume, for example, that the variance due to the operators is 0.815. However, this would be wrong. There are other sources of variation present in all put one of these variances. We must use the Expected Mean Square to find out what other sources of variation are present. We will use 2 to denote a variance due to a single source.