A decomposition method for efficient manufacturing of complex parts

Abstract

This paper presents a method to decompose three dimensional complex parts into readily available stock material to take advantage of advanced joining to build up a rigid assembly. The method generates many alternative assemblies by decomposing the solid geometry iteratively with cutting planes. Each assembly is then evaluated based on cost. The process continues until the developed search algorithm converges on a near optimal solution. Application of this method will reduce material waste, thus reducing per part processing time, energy consumption, and associated production costs. Example parts for a variety of metals show how the computational tool finds near optimal solutions for complex three dimensional solids.

Path Generation, Control, and Monitoring

“…Massoni et al [43] propose a method that automatically decomposes 3D complex models into parts with the goal of lowering overall production cost, and Luo et al [41] propose a framework called chopper also based on the beam search algorithm.…”