Designing modular product architecture for optimal overall product modularity

Abstract

ABSTRACTDesigning modular product architectures is beneficial to both product development and manufacturing. Several techniques exist for clustering product components into modules; all these techniques, with few exceptions, do not consider the hierarchical structure of the product. Product architecture consists of a number of hierarchical levels, which add a useful dimension to modularity analysis. Designing product architecture that maximises its overall modularity over all levels of the product structure is the main focus of this research. A novel mathematical programming model has been developed to construct the product structure tree for a given product with optimal modularity at all its hierarchical levels without prior knowledge of their number. A genetic algorithm capable of handling practical problem sizes was also developed. A hand-held body massager is used for demonstrating and validating the proposed modular product architecture design method. A case study from the automotive industry was employed for comparing the obtained modularity analysis output with the relevant state-of-the-art research, and demonstrating achieved improvements. Product modularity is addressed in this research using a new perspective which promotes optimal overall modularity. It improves management of product changes and variety leading to more cost-effective product development and manufacturing.