Recently, various broadcasting systems are rapidly switching from analog broadcasting to digital. There is necessity to design a tuner that is suitable for digital broadcasting. However, the function of the existing tuner circuit is unstable. In the study of this circuit, a new approach called standard S/N ratio was used in the two-step optimization. As a result, variability was reduced with a satisfactory reproducibility of conclusions. It was also confirmed that tuning the output to the target was possible.

Our company is producing the cutleries and dies used for in-company stamping machines to manufacture thin steel sheets for clutch discs. But the heat treatment conditions, which are most important in the manufacturing of cutleries and dies, have not yet been studied. In order to find the optimum heat treatment condition, technology development was conducted using dynamic characteristic (bending strength) and non-dynamic characteristic (hardness) in quality engineering. Two kinds of die materials were used in the study. As a result, the heat treatment condition with less variability in strength was successfully identified.

We adopt a belt fusing method as a fixing system of our electro photographic full color printer. The lifetime of the fusing unit used in this method ends with the cracking of the belt, which uses very thin nickel electroforming as the base material. In order to extend the lifetime, we have developed materials with excellent resistance to belt cracking. This paper presents the results of our new experiment, in which we modified the system design parameter and the standards by using the advice in previously presented results. We evaluated various metals using V-I characteristic evaluation, which was one of the evaluation methods that we have already suggested. As a result, we were able to significantly reduce the time required for evaluation. In addition, we defined the new electrical characteristics with reference to the concept of the standardized S/N ratio, resulting in the successful establishment of an evaluation method more versatile than the previous one.

Recently, the therapeutic riding is being spread in and out of the country as a method of rehabilitation. Therapeutic riding aims the relaxation of both mind and body by the contact with the animal, and it is expected that the use of this treatments will give the effect on phisical therapy. Therefore, measuring the effect of rehabilitation by therapeutic riding becomes an important subject. The main objective of this study was the measurement of the effect using Mahalanobis-Taguchi system. The selection of useful items for measurement was conducted for the costr eduction purpose. The trouble level (handicapped level) was omega-transformed and used as the signal. The logarithmic value of Mahalanobis distance was used as the output. Items were selected using orthogonal array and the S/N ratio of dynamic characteristic. From the results of item selection, 'quickness' and 'cleaning of the barn' were found to be effective items, while 'gender' and 'riding ability' were not. This report will contribute future studies on the effective rehabilitation through therapeutic riding. It will also contribute and give the hints regarding the prevention of dementia problem or the functional improvement of aged people.

The report describes an example where quality engineering is applied to develop and design a parts-cleaning machine that uses functional water recommended as part of an environmental measure. Before our analysis, we assumed that the basic efficiency was regarded as the absorption and desorption reaction of dirt on the surface of the object to be cleaned, and according to our assumption,when the signal and the property were respectively defined as the cleaning time and the dirt residue, the relational expression followed the primary chemical equation. With a mini-scale laboratory machine that was constructed for the examination, the repeatabilty of the gain was preferred. Furthermore, even with an actual production machine, the scale-up effect of the result was not shown and the repeatability of the gain was almost equal to the former. Conventionally, we use a production machine for the examination from the point of view of repeatability. There were a large number of restrictions, a long examination period, and large development costs, but through the application of quality engineering, we were able to reduce them by about 90%.

Through the application of a simulation method and quality engineering, the test process was eliminated and a power-saving thermal print head for thermal-transfer printers was designed. As is the case with semiconductors, thermal print heads are manufactured using a thin film process in which sputtering and etching are repeated. In order to improve the efficiency of the test process,which is not only expensive but also requires several months, a finite element method simulation is applied to our design process. However, until now, the application of the simulation method has enabled us to understand the phenomenon and design the principle, but has not been able to provide optimal designs. In this study, quality engineering was used in addition to simulation. As a result, we were able to successfully design a thermal print head with excellent stability and power consumption performance, even under error conditions,and we were able to skip the test process. As a result, with the introduction of quality engineering, the development process was completed in approximately ten days, considerably shorter than the conventional three to six months from test process to evaluation. Furthermore, the power-saving thermal print heads developed this time have already been used in new products.

"Ki-ketsu-sui" which is one of the diagnostic criteria used in traditional Japanese kampo medicine, is an advanced type of pattern recognition based on a doctor's experience and knowledge. We created unit spaces for"ki-ketsu-sui" from patients' questionnaire data, and studied the diagnosis and discrimination of the "oketsu" state by Mahalanobis distance based on the MMT system, creating multiple spaces by the inverse matrix method. As there were fewer patients than the number of questionnaire items, we divided the items into medically significant groups, created a number of unit spaces, and calculated multiple Mahalanobis distances. As a result, the distances calculated for symptomatic individuals showed remarkably high discriminability from the distances of the healthy group, enabling the diagnosis of "oketsu" patients to be quantified. This suggests a possible new guideline for kampo medicine.

In kampo diagnosis, it is important to diagnose a patient's "sho" accurately. This diagnosis has been based mostly on doctors' experience and knowledge. In this study, treating a patient's "sho" as a type of pattern, we made trial use of the MT system as a method of pattern recognition to diagnose the group of patients found to be in the "oketsu" state. The over 200 questionnaire items were divided into 15 major groups, on which a multiple matrix analysis was carried out by both the inverse matrix method (MT system) and the adjoint matrix method (MTA system), and the results obtained by the two methods were compared. Both methods led to the same conclusions, placing the symptomatic individuals at a distance from the others. This study provides a guideline for the analysis of medical data consisting only of count values.