Integration of Design Tools and Knowledge Capture into a CAD System: A Case Study

Abstract

Conceptual design phase Is partially supported by product Iifecycie management/computer-aided design (PLM/CAD) systems causing discontinuity of the design Information flow: customer needs -functional requirements -key characteristics -design parameters (DPs) -geometric DPs. Aiming to address this Issue, It is proposed a knowledge-based approach is proposed to Integrate quality function deployment, failure mode and effects analysis, and axiomatic design Into a commercial PLM/CAD system. A case study, main subject of this article, was carried out to validate the proposed process, to evaluate, by a pilot development, how the commercial PLM/CAD modules and application programming Interface could support the information flow, and based on the pilot scheme results to propose a full development framework.

Approach to integrate product conceptual design information into a computer-aided design system

“…A first case study related to a clutch system was conducted to evaluate the suitability of the proposed conceptual approach (Torres et al, 2010). Ultimately, the objective was the implementation of such approach into a commercial CAD system.…”

“…The proposed methodology is based on an information flow ( Figure 2) generated when executing the following steps (Torres et al, 2010):…”

“…The application of these techniques allows connecting customer requirements, functional requirements, product functions, product DPs, product function failures, and product key or critical characteristics, literature exists where the possible integration of such techniques is analyzed. Relevant references can be found in the studies by Prasad (2000) and Torres et al (2010) the three techniques can be found in the studies by Torres et al (2010) and Zheng et al (2012). Since the feasibility of an approach of integrating QFD, AD, and FMEA is shown in the literature, the first issue to analyze is whether information supporting such techniques is part of the product information models, and if so, whether such information was implemented into CAD systems.…”

“…VBA was also used to define the user interface of the prototype application. The prototype application was tested by executing two case studies that were initially manually executed (Torres et al, 2010;Zheng et al, 2012). The first case study was based on the design of a pressure plate of a friction clutch (Torres et al, 2010), and the second case study was based on the design of an aircraft Y-bolt component (Zheng et al, 2012).…”

“…The independence axiom and the information axiom proposed by the AD theory are out of scope of the proposed software development. The theoretical and methodological approach and the development framework were presented in the study by Torres et al (2010). This article focuses on the definition of the information model to support a continuous information flow from conceptual design to detailed design and its implementation into a commercial CAD system.…”