6.5.2 MBSE Supports Manufacturing System Design

Abstract

AbstractTo date, Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) has been deployed primarily in the product design domain. However, manufacturing system design problems are equally challenging, but there are many fewer design support tools in the hands of system designers. This paper describes how MBSE principles and methods can be used to make a powerful analysis tool readily accessible to manufacturing systems engineers. The MagicDraw™ SysML tool was used to create a domain specific language for electronics assembly, and the tool itself was customized to present an interface that was relatively easy for the manufacturing domain experts to use to create descriptions of products, resources, and processes. The domain specific language was mapped to a metamodel of the Arena™ discrete event simulation language, and the ATL© model transformation tool was used to automate the generation of the an instance of a simulation model from an instance of the electronics assembly system. The use of this kind of analysis automation can reduce by up to a factor of ten the time required to develop such simulation models.