Abstract
Generally, there are two alternative design approaches available to engineers: bottom-up and top-down. Considering the sharp increase in the complexity of most mechanical products, the top-down design approach is more widely adopted in the development of complex products. However, in traditional top-down design process, design parameters are communicated through single-skeleton models, and design units are strongly coupled due to the multi-dimensional complexity of products. Toward this end, a new top-down design approach based on multi-skeleton model is proposed in this article. First, in accordance with different kinds of design parameters, three major skeleton models are defined, including location skeleton model, published skeleton model, and design skeleton model. And the characteristics of multi-skeleton models are also described. Then, the top-down design process based on the multi-skeleton model is explored, especially in the multi-skeleton modeling phase. It is also illustrated in detail that how to realize design parameter transmission and design unit reuse. Subsequently, it elaborates the communicating way and structure optimization of design parameters to support parameters controlled publishing and design units reuse. Finally, a meteorological satellite and a crawler crane design cases are implemented to expound the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed framework.
Highlights
Recent advances in science and technology have led to a rapid increase in the complexity of most mechanical products and engineering systems,[1,2] whose design needs cooperation among different groups.[3,4,5] Traditionally, two alternative design methodologies, called top-down and bottom-up, have been used in the development of complex products.[4,6,7,8] the complexity of new product development forces many companies to rethink the way they design complex products
The other is a reasonable construction of skeleton models that can ensure an effective communication of design parameters
The proposed multiskeleton approach can be viewed in two aspects, multilevel skeleton modeling and multi-function skeleton modeling, which is distinguished from traditional skeleton design approach
Summary
Recent advances in science and technology have led to a rapid increase in the complexity of most mechanical products and engineering systems,[1,2] whose design needs cooperation among different groups.[3,4,5] Traditionally, two alternative design methodologies, called top-down and bottom-up, have been used in the development of complex products.[4,6,7,8] the complexity of new product development forces many companies to rethink the way they design complex products. Due to the limited support of traditional TDD approach, there are still a lot of unsolved problems including single transmission path of design parameters and complex coupling relationships among design units. In such a context, the work here is exactly meant to do some further research on TDD approach to promote the development efficiency of complex products. The other is a reasonable construction of skeleton models that can ensure an effective communication of design parameters In this way, the systematic approach to engineering design is brought to a level that provides a solid foundation for the successful development of complex products. Conclusions and suggestions for future work are provided in section ‘‘Conclusion and future work.’’
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