Orthogonal designs

What is orthogonality?
Two vectors are orthogonal if the sum of the products of their corresponding
elements is 0. For example, consider the following vectors a and b:

You can multiply the corresponding elements of the vectors to show the
following result:
a*b = 2(4) + 3(1) + 5(1) + 0(4) = 8 + 3 + 5 + 0 = 0
This shows that the two vectors are orthogonal.
The concept of orthogonality is important in Design of Experiments because it
says something about independence. Experimental analysis of an orthogonal
design is usually straightforward because you can estimate each main effect
and interaction independently. If your design is not orthogonal, either by plan or
by accidental loss of data, your interpretation might not be as straightforward.
The importance of this is shown with the following example. Consider a 2 3 full
factorial with eight runs.

1
To show that each column (vector) is orthogonal to the other columns, multiply
A*B, A*C and B*C.

A*B = 1(1) +1(1) 1(1) 1(1) 1(1) 1(1) + 1(1) + 1(1) = 4 + 4 = 0

A*C = 1(1) +1(1) 1(1) 1(1) 1(1) 1(1) + 1(1) + 1(1) = 4 + 4 = 0

B*C = 1(1) 1(1) 1(1) + 1(1) + 1(1) 1(1) + 1(1) + 1(1) = 4 + 4 =

0
So in a sense, factor A is estimated independently from B and C and vice versa.
The estimates for the effects and coefficients will remained unchanged when
you remove interactions from the model. The other output will change as the
experimental error (MSE) is adjusted accordingly with more degrees of freedom.

In conclusion, a designed experiment is orthogonal if the effects of any factor

balance out (sum to zero) across the effects of the other factors. Orthogonality
guarantees that the effect of one factor or interaction can be estimated
separately from the effect of any other factor or interaction in the model.

Determine whether a design is orthogonal

To determine whether your design is orthogonal, do the following:
NOTE

When analyzing factorial designs, if the design is displayed in uncoded units in

the worksheet, first choose Stat > DOE > Display Design, select Coded
units, and click OK.
1. Choose Stat > ANOVA > General Linear

Model or Stat > DOE > Factorial > Analyze Factorial Design and
complete the dialog box as usual.
Note

You can also do this for Response Surface, Taguchi, and Mixture designs.
To store a design matrix in Taguchi, you must be fitting a linear model.
2. Click Storage.
3. Select Design matrix. Click OK in each dialog box.
4. Sum the degrees of freedom for all terms in the model, except Error. The
degrees of freedom are in the DF column of the ANOVA table in the
Session window output.
5. Choose Data > Copy > Matrix to Columns.
6. In Copy from matrix, enter XMAT1.
7. Under Store Copied Data, in In current worksheet, in columns, enter
a range of empty columns large enough to include a column for each
degree of freedom in the model plus one for the intercept. (For example, if

you have 7 degrees of freedom in your model, you will need 8 columns
total and could enter C11-C18.) Click OK.
8. Choose Stat > Basic Statistics > Correlation.
9. In Variables, enter the range of columns from step 7.
10.

Deselect Display p-values. Click OK.

11. In the matrix displayed in the Session window, look for any nonzero terms.

A positive or negative value indicates that the two columns and their
associated terms are not orthogonal.
Note

When analyzing a factorial design, the design matrix will store the terms
in uncoded units if the worksheet is in uncoded
units. Stat > DOE > Factorial > Analyze Factorial Design will perform
the analysis in coded units. When analyzing a response surface design,
the design matrix will store the terms in coded or uncoded units
depending on the units in which you choose to analyze the data.

What is a designed experiment?

A designed experiment is a series of runs, or tests, in which you purposefully

make changes to input variables at the same time and observe the responses. In
industry, designed experiments can be used to systematically investigate the
process or product variables that affect product quality. After you identify the
process conditions and product components that affect product quality, you can
direct improvement efforts to enhance a product's manufacturability, reliability,
quality, and field performance.
For example, you work at an offset printing company where some customers
have complained of pages coming unattached from their books' bindings. You
suspect several factors: glue temperature, paper type, and cooling time. You
want to determine which factors, or combinations of factors, significantly affect
the effectiveness of your company's binding technique. When you create a
designed experiment, Minitab automatically randomizes the run order of the

design and displays the design in your worksheet. The run order is the ordered
sequence of factor combinations. You can use the worksheet to record your
responses when you do your experiment.
Designed experiments are often done in four phases: planning, screening
(also called process characterization), optimization, and verification.
Which standard designs can Minitab create?

Minitab offers many different designed experiments to meet your needs.

In This Topic

Factorial designs

Response surface designs

Mixture designs

Taguchi designs

Factorial designs
A type of designed experiment that is frequently used to determine the
important factors in a process. With a factorial design, you can estimate the
significance of main effects and interaction effects. You can also check for the
presence of cubic or quadratic effects. To estimate cubic or quadratic effects,
use a response surface design.
2-level factorial design (default generators)
Choose this option to create a full factorial design or to create a fractional
factorial design. The default generators create the design with the highest
resolution for the number of factors and the number of runs.
2-level factorial design (specify generators)
You can use your own generators to specify which subset of runs to
include in a fractional factorial design. You can also specify generators to
add factors and define blocks by specifying the generators for the terms.
2-level split-plot design (hard-to-change factors)

A designed experiment that includes at least one hard-to-change factor

that is difficult to completely randomize due to time or cost constraints.
Plackett-Burman design
Plackett-Burman designs are usually resolution III, 2-level designs. In a
resolution III design, main effects are aliased with 2-way interactions.
Therefore, you should only use these designs when you are willing to
assume that 2-way interactions are negligible.
Use Plackett-Burman designs to identify the most important factors early
in the experimentation phase. For example, say you are examining the
various factors that affect ice cream texture: fat content, pasteurization
temperature, homogenization process, mixing speed, draw temperature,
emulsifier, stabilizer, and cooling speed. You can use a Plackett-Burman
experiment to identify the most important main effects, use fractional or
full factorial designs to study them more, then use response surface
designs to optimize your process.
General full factorial design
An designed experiment in which the factors can have any number of
levels.

Response surface designs

A set of advanced design of experiments techniques that help you
better understand your response. Response surface design
methodology is often used to refine models after important factors
have been determined using factorial designs; especially if you
suspect curvature in the response surface.
Central composite
An experimental design that models curvature by adding center and axial
points to a 2-level factorial design.
Box-Behnken
Box-Behnken designs usually have fewer design points than central
composite designs, thus, they are less expensive to run with the same
number of factors. They can efficiently estimate the first- and second-

order coefficients; however, they can't include runs from a factorial

experiment. Box-Behnken designs always have 3 levels per factor, unlike
central composite designs which can have up to 5. Also unlike central
composite designs, Box-Behnken designs never include runs where all
factors are at their extreme setting, such as all of the low settings.

Mixture designs
Mixture experiments are a special class of response surface
experiments in which the product under investigation is made up
of several components or ingredients. Designs for these
experiments are useful because many product design and
development activities in industrial situations involve formulations
or mixtures. In these situations, the response is a function of the
proportions of the different ingredients in the mixture. For
example, you might be developing a pancake mixture that is
made of flour, baking powder, milk, eggs, and oil. Or, you might
be developing an insecticide that blends four chemical
ingredients.
In the simplest mixture experiment, the response (the quality or
performance of the product based on some criterion) depends on
the relative proportions of the components (ingredients). The
amount of components, measured in weights, volumes, or some
other units, add up to a common total. In contrast, in a factorial
design, the response varies depending on the amount of each
factor.

Simplex Centroid

Simplex Lattice Degree 1

Simplex Lattice Degree 2

Simplex Lattice Degree 3

Simplex centroid
Mixture designs in which the design points are arranged in a uniform
manner (or lattice) over an L-simplex. With a simplex centroid design, you
can estimate terms up to the same order as the number of components.
For a smaller design, you can use a simplex lattice that limits the terms

you estimate to a lower order.

You can estimate up to a special cubic model with this simplex centroid design.

Simplex lattice
Mixture designs in which the design points are arranged in a uniform
manner (or lattice) over an L-simplex. The degree of the lattice
determines the order of the terms that you can fit.

The 1 degree lattice has fewer runs than the simplex centroid design, but you can
estimate only a simple model.

The 1 degree lattice has more runs than the simplex centroid design, so you can
estimate a more complicated model.

Extreme vertices
Mixture designs that cover only a subportion or smaller space within the
simplex.
The goal of an extreme vertices design is to choose design points that
adequately cover the design space. The following figure shows the
extreme vertices for two three-component designs with both upper and
lower constraints:

The light gray lines represent the lower and upper bound constraints on the
components. The dark gray area represents the design space. The points are put at
the extreme vertices of design space.

Taguchi designs
A Taguchi design is a designed experiment that lets you
choose a product or process that functions more
consistently in the operating environment. Taguchi designs
recognize that not all factors that cause variability can be
controlled. These uncontrollable factors are called noise
factors. Taguchi designs try to identify controllable factors
(control factors) that minimize the effect of the noise
factors. During experimentation, you manipulate noise
factors to force variability to occur and then determine
optimal control factor settings that make the process or
product robust, or resistant to variation from the noise
factors. A process designed with this goal will produce more
consistent output. A product designed with this goal will
deliver more consistent performance regardless of the
environment in which it is used.
A well-known example of Taguchi designs is from the Ina
Tile Company of Japan in the 1950s. The company was
manufacturing too many tiles outside specified dimensions.
A quality team discovered that the temperature in the kiln
used to bake the tiles varied, causing nonuniform tile
dimension. They could not eliminate the temperature
variation because building a new kiln was too costly. Thus,
temperature was a noise factor. Using Taguchi designed
experiments, the team found that by increasing the clay's
lime content, a control factor, the tiles became more

resistant, or robust, to the temperature variation in the kiln,

letting them manufacture more uniform tiles.
2-level design
A designed experiment where each control factor has only 2 levels.
3-level design
A designed experiment where each control factor has exactly 3 levels.
4-level design
A designed experiment where each control factor has exactly four levels.
5-level design
A designed experiment where each control factor has exactly 5 levels.
Mixed level design
A designed experiment where the control factors have different numbers
of levels.