RELYING ON THE COMPUTER TO ANALYZE DATA ROM MEASUREMENT OF STANDARDS

Nuclear manufacturing facilities rely on many measurement systems for material control. To control the systems, facilities must measure many standards. This measurement of standards generates a large amount of data which must be processed. NFS has designed a series of computer programs for evaluating measurement control data. The programs rely on SAS software installed on the NFS central computer. Data concerning every measurement system and all current standards are stored in two SAS data files in the central computer. Each week data generated from measuring standards are entered into additional SAS files in the central computer. The computer then processes the data and generates updated control charts, as well as estimates of bias for all standards. At the end of each inventory period, the computer calculates variance components and bias for all measurement systems and updates control limits for the standards. This method of analyzing data has reduced the time required to prepare control charts, to calculate bias and error, and to revise control limits. It has also eliminated duplicate data entry and improved oversight of the measurement control program.