In this paper, we present our findings on the development of a taxonomy for electromechanical components. In building this taxonomy, we have two main objectives: First, we strive to establish a framework for future computational tools that archive, search, or reuse component knowledge during the conceptual phase of design. Second, we aim to define a standard vocabulary that derives uniformity and consistency in the representation of electromechanical component space. Through both empirically dissecting existing products and defining categories based on functional analysis, we defined 135 generic component types. The use and necessity of the resulting taxonomy by a suite of computational design tools are illustrated in two applications of conceptual design.
To address emerging issues due to global product development and shortening product development cycles, we propose a modular product design methodology using interface-based module descriptions published through cyber-infrastructure. In this paper, we describe (1) a general way of defining interfaces, partially utilizing a standardized language of product functionality known as the Functional Basis, (2) a formal way of representing components in eXtensible Markup Language that defines a new Module Description Language (MDL), and (3) the application of the proposed methodology to the design of a product family of electronic screwdrivers, a mechanical product, extending previous work with electrical products.
This paper discusses a new concept generation technique that improves upon a previous automated concept generation theory and algorithm developed by Bryant, et al. at the University of Missouri – Rolla. The previous automated concept generation algorithm utilizes the design knowledge present in a repository to produce an array of partial concept solutions. While the previous algorithm is capable of handling branched functional models, it does not efficiently remove all of the infeasible partial solutions to leave only whole concepts in the final results. A matrix-based algorithm is presented in this paper that utilizes the result from the previous concept generation algorithm and solves for complete solutions of branched concepts. The presented algorithm eliminates incomplete and infeasible concepts or components from the results and generates a set of full solutions for further analysis by a designer. The details of the algorithm are described in this paper, and a peanut-sheller example is used to illustrate the effective use of the algorithm for producing branched concept variants.
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