The Kitchen is an isolated location on the second floor of the plant; the Kitchen, produces caramel for the Alpha line to deposit on a chocolate patty base. The quality technicians observe caramel moisture, the current Key Performance Indicator (KPI), to characterize the caramel. Following the Kitchen production, the caramel flows to the depositor on the plant’s base floor. The caramel is deposited at roughly 62°C, which is significantly greater than the temperature in the Kitchen. Management, operators, and quality technicians believed the caramel moisture in the Kitchen and depositor were equivalent. The results exhibited there were extreme variations between the two locations and possibly machine deficiencies. The management staff pivoted to observe caramel viscosity to augment the KPI and added a project to predict the caramel viscosity given the Kitchen setpoints.
