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E-Math News Volume 3, Number 2 March 2001
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Contents
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Schedule of Public Classes
Math in Everyday Life - Investing for Retirement How
Much Money
Will You Need?
Math in Industry - Capability Ratios
Family Math - Math activities for ages 1-6
Book Review - Applied Reliability 2nd edition
Ask Statman - More Tests for Non-Bell-Shaped Data
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"Especially in a technical business where the
rate of progress is
rapid, a continuing program of education must be
undertaken and
maintained."
David Packard
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Schedule of Public Classes
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Date Class Location
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
May 14 & 15, 2001 Statistical Process Control and
Practical
Measurement System Analysis Anacortes, WA
May 16-18, 2001 Performing Objective Experiments
Anacortes, WA
This class includes a free whale watching trip!
August 8-10, 2001 Performing Objective Experiments
Anacortes, WA
This class includes a free whale watching trip!
SAVE $300 BY REGISTERING EARLY!
Visit
http//www.mathoptions.com/class_registration.htm for details.
You can learn more about these classes and register
to attend at
http//www.mathoptions.com/public.htm
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Math in Everyday Life
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Investing for Retirement How Much Money Will You
Need?
Planning for retirement requires that you estimate
the amount of money
you will need to have available and develop a plan
for accumulating
that money. This article will provide the math you
will need to
estimate the amount of money to accumulate. The next
issue will
explain the math you will need to develop your plan
for accumulating
it.
The first step is to estimate your monthly expenses
during your years
of retirement. This step is actually very difficult
because our
uncertainty about the future is relatively large.
What will the
rate of inflation be over the next 30 or 40 years?
How much will
taxes increase? What will your health be like? What
interest will
you be able to collect on your money?
Although this step is difficult, it is essential.
Without a monthly
requirement, you have no way to calculate the amount
of money to
accumulate. You should consult with a good financial
planner who
can help you to estimate this amount based on the
lifestyle you
expect to have upon retiring.
Once you have an estimate of your monthly expenses,
you are ready to
calculate the amount of money you will need to
accumulate.
The first step is to determine how you would like to
manage your
monthly withdrawals after retirement. Would you like
to take out only
the interest earned on your money, leaving the
principle untouched
for distribution to your heirs? Or would you be
willing to reduce the
principle on a regular basis, leaving little behind
when you die?
The second step differs depending on your decision
from the first step.
If you want to leave your principle untouched and
withdraw only the
interest, the calculation of the amount you will need
is very simple.
You need to know the monthly withdrawal you intend to
make and
an estimate of the interest your money will be making
after your
retirement. This will depend on where you keep your
money. Here
again you should ask a good financial advisor to help
you with this
estimate. The calculation is, then,
Amount to Accumulate = Monthly Withdrawal / Monthly
Interest Rate
For example, suppose you want to withdraw $4000 per
month and you
estimate that you will be able to collect 5% interest
on your money
annually. Your monthly interest rate is 5% / 12 =
0.42%. This
monthly interest rate is 0.0042 when expressed as a
decimal.
Amount to Accumulate = $4000 / 0.0042 = $952,381 -
nearly a million
dollars.
If you are willing to withdraw part of your principle
each month, you
will need to accumulate less money -- but your
calculation will be a
little more involved. You will not only need to know
the amount of your
monthly withdrawal and an estimate of the interest
you will make during
your retirement, but you also need an estimate of how
long you will
live. The calculation is, then,
1. Calculate the number of months you expect to live
after retiring.
2. Raise 1 + the Monthly Interest Rate to the power
of the number
of months you expect to live after retiring.
3. Divide 1 by the number from step 2.
4. Subtract the number from step 3 from 1.
5. Multiply the number from step 4 by the monthly
withdrawal.
6. Divide the number from step 5 by the monthly
interest rate
expected.
7. The result is the amount of money you will need to
accumulate.
For example, suppose you want to withdraw $4000 per
month and your
estimated monthly interest rate is 0.0042 (5%
annually). You want
to retire at age 65 and expect to live to age 85.
1. (85 - 65) x 12 = 240 months in retirement.
2. (1 + 0.0042)^240 = 2.734
3. 1 / 2.734 = 0.3658
4. 1 - 0.3658 = 0.6342
5. $4000 x 0.6342 = $2536.80
6. $2536.80 / 0.0042 = $604,000.00
7. You will need to accumulate about $604,000.
Next issue The math used to develop a plan to
accumulate this money.
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Math in Industry
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Capability Ratios
by John Raffaldi
In manufacturing (and probably any other time we have
a tolerance),
sometimes our thoughts are directed to determining
how much of this
tolerance is due to variation in the measurement
process and the
manufacturing process. Typically, in these
situations, we are
talking about capability ratios.
There are at least 18 capability ratios, each claimed
to be useful
by a published statistician at one time or another.
But today, we
will only worry about two of the most common ones,
Cp, and Cpk.
Capability ratios help us to judge whether a process
is capable or
not. If a process is not capable, it means that
chances are good that
the process we have for manufacturing parts is
unlikely to make us
profitable because of scrap production rates. A
capable process is a
process in which essentially no bad parts are made
and is likely to
keep us in business.
There are primarily three things necessary for
determining a
capability ratio for a process with only random
variation present
An Upper Specification Limit (USL) - a number which a
measurement
should not exceed to be called good.
A Lower Specification Limit (LSL) - a number which a
measurement
should not be less than to be called good.
A process standard deviation - A measurement of how
the process varies
over time. ("Sigma" is another term for
standard deviation.)
A small standard deviation indicates a process where
there is little
variation -- a good characteristic to have in any
process. It turns out
that 3 times the standard deviation less than the
average is about the
lowest measurement you will normally see, and 3 times
the standard
deviation above the average is about the largest
measurement you will
normally see. This range covers 6 times the standard
deviation and
is often referred to as a "6 sigma range."
For "6 sigma range" 99.73%
of all parts produced, or about 27 out of 10000
parts, would be
outside of the range. This range is the "natural
tolerance" for a
manufacturing process. Most math books have reference
for calculating
standard deviations, and almost any calculator will
perform the math
for you. (Before trusting your calculator to
calculate standard
deviation you can test it at
http//www.mathoptions.com/calculatortest.htm)
The capability ratio (Cp) is the required tolerance
range (Upper
Specification Limit (USL) minus the Lower
Specification Limit (LSL))
divided by the natural tolerance range (6 sigma
range). In equation
form,
Cp=(USL-LSL) / 6*Standard deviation
As stated above, this is a measurement of how much of
the tolerance
is consumed by the process and measurement variation.
A Cp of 1.0
indicates that the required tolerance range is equal
to the natural
tolerance range. Usually a Cp of 1.0 is considered
marginally
adequate because 99.73% of the parts are acceptable
if the process
average is centered between the USL and LSL.
If the process average shifts or the variation
increases, many more
out-of-specification parts would exist. A process
with its average
centered that has a Cp index of 1.0 would have 27 out
of 10,000 parts
manufactured out of tolerance. Most processes should
have a Cp of
at least 1.33. With a Cp of 1.33 the required
tolerance range is
8 standard deviations wide (8 Sigma). A process with
its average
centered will only produce 64 parts out of a million
that are likely
to be bad due to random variation.
The Cpk is another type of capability ratio, but it
is better than the
Cp because it takes into account the process average
location relative
to the USL and LSL. Cp can be divided into two values
the Cpu and Cpl
(where the "u" and "l" indicate
the Cp for upper and lower
specifications).
Cpu =(USL-X2bar) / 3sigma
Cpl =(X2bar-LSL) / 3sigma
(X2bar is the overall average measurement of parts
measured for prior
samples.)
The Cpk is the smaller of the Cpu and Cpl. Just like
the Cp, the
lower ratio should not be less than 1.33. If the
process is exactly
centered, the Cp will equal the Cpk.
From a gauge error standpoint, if we decrease our
measurement error,
we are likely to increase our capability ratio. This
is because the
gauging error is included in the process variation.
If you are interested in more detailed information on
capability
ratios, a good place to look is at the SEMATECH/NIST
on-line
statistics manual at
http//www.itl.nist.gov/div898/handbook/,
then do a search on process capability. Similarly the
StatSoft
web site www.statsoft.com has an on-line statistics
book at
http//www.statsoft.com/textbook/stathome.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You can learn about Statistical Process Control and
Gage R&R Studies
May 14 & 15, 2001, in Anacortes, WA, in the
workshops,
Statistical Process Control and Practical Measurement
System Analysis
You can learn more about these classes and register
to attend at
http//www.mathoptions.com/public.htm
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Family Math
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Math Activities for Ages One Through Six
by Beth Heffernan
Caution! You may have fun while stretching your
child's mind.
Up to age Four or so, numbers are mainly fun sounds
with
meaning only in relation to your child's immediate
present.
Children enjoy counting in many languages for this
reason-more
fun sounds to roll off their tongues. Beginning at
age One you
should count everything, even before they can talk.
It is fun,
it is real and it establishes a base for precise
language that
you will always use to describe their unfolding
world. No baby
talk (at least with your children)! Using counting
rhythms and
rhymes is even more fun, and is useful in introducing
music
to your child.
Geometry begins with exact language. Point out the
shapes
of surrounding objects, the triangle of their
cracker, the
sphere of the cotton ball, the octagon of the stop
sign. Count
the sides. How many sides in a circle? Introduce two
and
three dimensions using their bodies, then items you
point out on
neighborhood walks. Children understand positioning,
high vs.
low, under, over and in between, and definitely more
or less.
At age Two, when children begin talking (and never
stop), it is
especially important to count like objects, i.e.
three marsh-
mallow cylinders or four cup cylinders. When the
cookies are
"all gone" everyone understands zero. Food
is a wonderful tool
for displaying fractions and sets. Let your child
help you cut
his or her sandwich into thirds or fourths or tenths.
Let him or
her divide the snack into equal sets for friends.
Great games
can be played with M&Ms, right down to
subtracting them to zero
into the lucky players' mouths.
Measurement is an integral part of math and science.
Water is
a perfect starting material. Dig a hole in the sand
and see
how many buckets of water fill it. Better toy stores
sell sets
of telescoping cups that are volumetrically correct,
and make
the best bath toys for years at different levels of
under-
standing. Skills achieved with pouring water
translate easily
to later cooking projects with lots of measuring and
fractions
involved.
A Five or so can plant a garden and learn linear
measurement of
rows and columns. Measure depth while planting seeds
to the
proper depth. At this age money becomes important and
so real.
Many children love to play store. Provide them with
all your
canned goods and a basket of small change or toy cash
register.
Let them wheel and deal with each other. If they
receive an
allowance or gift money, point out to your Six that a
pack of
Pokemon cards is $3.99 at this store and $2.99
elsewhere. Let
them pay for their purchases themselves and receive
the change.
Learn successive counting in card games which require
dealing
equal numbers of cards to players.
An inexpensive pad of puzzles is a handy tool when
waiting with
your child. Compare pictures with six differences.
Match like
shapes. The truly desperate parent, during a long car
trip,
can offer as many cents as the child can count, in
any language.
Infinity is the amount of love we have for each of
our children.
Next issue Math activities for ages 6-12.
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Beth Heffernan is Vice President of Math Options. You
can reach
her at mailtoBeth@MathOptions.com
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Book Review
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Applied Reliability 2nd edition, by Paul A. Tobias
and David C.
Trindade
by Dr. Charles Whitman
This is an excellent book for the beginner to the
world of
reliability. The authors are light on mathematical
proofs and
heavy on practical examples.
While you should be familiar with basic calculus to
understand some
of the concepts, you can still benefit with a good
knowledge of
algebra.
The first chapter covers the basics of probability
and descriptive
statistics. No prior knowledge is assumed. It then
proceeds to
describe the more common life distributions like the
exponential,
Weibull, extreme value, normal and lognormal. The
authors provide
guidance on how to tell which distribution to use for
your data.
For cases when you don't know the distribution, they
demonstrate the
utility of the Kaplan-Meier technique.
Different approaches of calculating a distribution's
parameters are
discussed, including graphical methods. The concept
of censoring is
introduced along with ways of dealing with censored
observations.
Special emphasis is placed on plotting data. This
helps the reader
get a "feel" for what is going on and how
to think about the concepts
presented.
The book also has an entire chapter on accelerated
testing. The
Arrhenius model is discussed, along with variations
of it. In a
later chapter, acceptance sampling is explained.
Throughout the
book, the authors use plain language and practical
examples to help
the reader understand key concepts. For those who
need to know the
basic techniques of reliability, this book is a must.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dr. Whitman writes the "Ask Statman Column in
E-Math News." He
is a Statistician for Agere Systems.
You can purchase a copy of "Applied Reliability
2nd edition,"
by Paul A. Tobias and David C. Trindade from
Amazon.com at the link
below
http//www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0442004699/mathoptionsinc
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Ask Statman
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Written by Dr. Charles Whitman
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As promised last issue, Statman will explain another
test for data
that doesn't fall in Bell-Shaped piles - non-Normal
data. The
test is the Mann- Whitney test and is described below
Let's consider one other test called the rank sum
test (or
Mann-Whitney test). This is used for comparing two
independent
samples when the observations are quantitative. The
rank sum test
is different than the sign test (discussed in the
last issue)in
that the data need not be paired. In fact, the data
can even
come from samples of different sizes. Let's suppose
we want
to know if, on the average, treatment 1 produces
observations
which are different (larger or smaller) than
treatment 2. Note
that I say "on the average". Suppose
treatment 1 really is
different than treatment 2. Even though this is true,
the
data may indicate no difference. Since we are dealing
with data,
and data have variation, there is some chance that we
will observe
no difference when in fact there is one.
Suppose we have two different processes for drawing
wire we want to
compare (Drawing wire means pulling it through a
small hole that will
deform it uniformly, decreasing its diameter to that
of the hole.)
Sometimes after drawing, small cracks appear in the
wire. The cracks
are undesirable and we want to find out if one
drawing method is
preferred. Several pieces of wire, each of the same
length, are
randomly selected from the parent wire spool produced
by each process.
The size of the sample for drawing process 1 is N1=
10, and the size
of the second sample for drawing process 2 is N2 =
12. Let
N = N1 + N2 = 22. The number of cracks in each sample
is counted
for each method. First, we tabulate the results.
No. cracks No. cracks
observed observed
for for
process 1 process 2
20 100
0 55
1 0
15 77
3 86
55 61
37 30
3 15
3 59
0 0
5
10
The next step is to rank all the observations from
lowest to
highest, keeping track of the treatment. If the
number of cracks
from each sample were different, then a sample with
no cracks
would have rank 1, another with 1 crack would be rank
2, etc.
Two or more samples with the same number of cracks
are "tied".
Unfortunately, ties make life more difficult. For
example, the
four samples with 0 cracks are tied. Should they all
get rank 1?
Should they all get rank 4? When there are ties, an
"average"
rank is used.
To find the average rank, we start by assigning all
the
observations an intermediate rank. In this
intermediate step, we
don't need to pay attention to the sample's
treatment. In our
example, the four samples with 0 cracks are assigned
intermediate
ranks 1, 2, 3, and 4 since they are the four smallest
observations.
Next, we average the intermediate ranks. The average
of 1 through
4 is 2.5, so all observations with 0 cracks have a
rank of 2.5.
The other ties receive a rank that is the average of
their
intermediate ranks. The following table should help
make this clear.
No. cracks Process Intermediate Rank Rank
0 1 1 2.5
0 1 2 2.5
0 2 3 2.5
0 2 4 2.5
1 1 5 5
3 1 6 7
3 1 7 7
3 1 8 7
5 2 9 9
10 2 10 10
15 1 11 11.5
15 2 12 11.5
20 1 13 13
30 2 14 14
37 1 15 15
55 1 16 16.5
55 2 17 16.5
59 2 18 18
61 2 19 19
77 2 20 20
86 2 21 21
100 2 22 22
I think you can see why we ignored the drawing method
when assigning
intermediate ranks. All ties received the same rank,
regardless
of the treatment. The next step is to sum the ranks
from the
different treatments (hence the name "rank sum
test"). We'll
call the sum of the ranks for process 1 R1, and the
sum of the
ranks for process 2 R2. Their values are R1 = 87 and
R2 = 166.
As a check, R1 + R2 should equal N*(N + 1)/2 =
22*23/2 = 253.
After finding R1 and R2 we calculate U and U' using
the equations
below. The smaller of U and U' is then compared to a
tabulated
critical value to get the p-value. The formulas for U
and U' are
U = N1*N2+N1(N1+1)/2-R1
U' = N1*N2-U
If there are no ties, then the value of U is the
number of times a
sample from method 1 is ranked before a sample from
method 2.
Similarly, the value of U' is the number of times a
sample from
method 2 is ranked before a sample in method 1. In
the presence
of ties, this is only approximately true. Using the
above formulas,
we find that U = 88 and U' = 32.
To make the interpretation of U and U' clearer,
consider the extreme
case where every sample from method 1 is ranked
before method 2.
In that case, method 1 clearly produces fewer cracks
and U' would
be zero. If the reverse were true, then U would be
zero. In our
case, U'=32 is smaller than U=88 indicating that
observations from
process 1 are usually ranked before process 2. Thus,
process 1
appears superior. We must use statistical tests to
determine if
the difference between the two methods is
significant.
Now we compare the smaller of U and U' to a critical
value. From
the Mann-Whitney table
(http//www.mathoptions.com/utable.htm) the
critical value of 24 (N1=10, N2=12) corresponds to a
p-value of 0.02
and the critical value of 34 corresponds to a p-value
of 0.1. (If there
are ties, then the p-values corresponding to the
critical values will
only be approximate.) Since 32 is between 24 and 34,
the p-value for
this data must be between 0.02 and 0.1. Said another
way, we are
more than 90% confident that the two methods of
drawing wire produce
a different number of cracks. Since we want a process
that produces
fewer cracks, we should pick process 1.
As in the sign test, we can use an approximation when
the sample size
is large (N1 and N2 > 9). (As in the case for U
and U', this formula
for z assumes no ties. The presence of ties requires
a small correction.
This correction is not important in most situations.)
In this case,
the z-score is calculated as
z = [ |N1(N+1)-2R1| -1]/sqrt(N1*N2(N+1)/3)
where all the terms have been previously defined. In
this example,
z = 1.81. This corresponds to a probability of 0.035,
or a
p-value of 2 x 0.035 = 0.07 (93% confidence)
(http//www.mathoptions.com/normal.htm).
(As noted in the previous Statman article, we must
double the probability
since this is a two-tailed test.) This is comparable
to the prior analysis
that had a p-value < 0.1. Again, it appears that
process 1 produces
fewer cracks than process 2.
In summary, we have discussed two different methods
for comparing
treatments when we don't have bell-shaped data. At
this point you
may be asking, "If we can use a non-parametric
test instead of a
parametric one (which must assume a distribution),
why not just
use the non-parametric test all the time?" It
turns out that
non-parametric tests are generally less powerful at
determining
differences between samples. That is, it can be more
difficult to
tell if the two treatments are different (get a
significant p-value)
using a non-parametric test. In the t-test, the
assumption of
bell-shaped data (normality) adds power. So, the
moral of the
story is that you should use a parametric test like
the t-test
when you can. But if you can't, use a non-parametric
test instead.
Many other non-parametric tests exist to help you. If
you'd like
to hear more just let me know.
Thanks,
Statman.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you have a question for Statman, please send it to
mailtoStatman@MathOptions.com. Statman will answer
questions about basic
statistics that are of general interest to people
working in industry.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Copyright 2000 by William D. Kappele, Beth Heffernan,
John Raffaldi
and Charles S. Whitman
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If you like E-Math News, please forward it to a
friend.
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