Open Architecture Products Research Articles

An approach to coupling analysis for open architecture product

During the configuration process of open architecture products (OAPs), adaptive change is inevitable to meet customers' personalised demands. However, the coupling between modules makes adaptive changes of open architecture products more difficult. For the coupling between modules in open architecture product design, an approach to analysing the coupling between modules is proposed. The implications of adaptive change for open architecture products are explained, and the interface relationships among the common platform, customised modules, and personalised modules are analysed. The coupling modes of three cases are discussed, i.e. the coupling between modules under the same branch, between modules under different branches with only functional collaboration, and between modules under different branches with function-structure correlation. The coupling degrees are calculated with consideration of the number of connections between modules and their comprehensive correlation degree. The structural complexity of the module is considered by development cost, development time, change cost, and change time, which is expressed with the information content in axiomatic design. Based on structural complexity, the dependency, and coupling degree between modules, the calculation method of change impact degree between modules is presented. The method on coupling analysis between modules in open architecture product design for personalised electric winches is illustrated.

Blockchain-enabled digital twin collaboration platform for heterogeneous socialized manufacturing resource management

Social manufacturing is conceptualised as a new type of networked manufacturing paradigm that supports the organisation of socialised manufacturing resources (SMRs) to satisfy the growth of personalised demands on crowd intelligence in a timely manner when co-creating open architecture products. The high participation of each stakeholder in this type of product production places a higher requirement on sufficient collaboration among social, cyber and physical spaces. However, under a decentralised social manufacturing network, the management of SMRs has encountered some real-life challenges in terms of their distributed and heterogeneous features. Hence, this paper proposes a blockchain-enabled digital twin collaboration platform (BcDTCP) as an integrated solution to address these challenges. A hybrid domain-driven design method is presented to design and implement business-knowledge driven systems. To address the heterogeneity of SMRs, a ubiquitous object structure is designed to flexibly adjust the functionality of the digital twin. Blockchain is introduced to construct a peer-to-peer network to organise the SMRs in a decentralised manner. Additionally, a timed coloured Petri net-based workflow is adopted to formulise the collaboration logic into a smart contract executed on the blockchain. Finally, a demonstrative case study is conducted to verify and evaluate the proposed BcDTCP under a 3D printing scenario.

Modular architecture principles – MAPs: a key factor in the development of sustainable open architecture products

ABSTRACTModularity is one of the most useful tools employed in the product development process. Regarding functionality, the use of modules is common to generate flexible platforms to manufacture products and product families that require functional variations. In the current globalized market, the mass individualization or personalization is the preferred production model that delivers cost-effectiveness and satisfaction at the level of the market of one. In this model, the modularity is employed as a powerful concept applied not only for the manufacture but also for the use and final disposal stages, in which the design of modules provides functionalities and features that satisfy a variety of specifications for different market segments. Despite the existence of approaches in modularity and its usefulness in product development, it is possible to identify a lack of analysis of modular and open architecture to enhance the sustainability performance of products regarding strategies to diminish adverse impacts during their lifecycle. This paper provides an analysis of the influence and potential of Modular Architecture Principles – MAPs in the sustainable design of open architecture products. Additionally, lifecycle considerations are analysed to identify and propose strategies that enforce the sustainability performance of products concerning personalization from early design stagesAbbreviations: MAPs: Modular Architecture Principles; FMS: Flexible Manufacturing System; RMS: Reconfigurable Manufacturing System; EOL: End Of Life; LCA: Life Cycle Assessment; QFD: Quality Function Deployment; DFMA: Design For Manufacturing And Assembly

Makerchain: A blockchain with chemical signature for self-organizing process in social manufacturing

The growth of personalized demands requires socialized resources to timely self-organize themselves with crowd intelligence for co-creating open architecture products. This social manufacturing paradigm drives an increased demand for makers to track the authenticity and quality of products. A new decentralized blockchain-driven model, named Makerchain, is presented to handle the cyber-credit of social manufacturing among various makers. An anti-counterfeiting method composed of chemical signature is proposed to represent unique features of personalized products. Twinning unique signature data to blockchain and other functional databases is realized and anticipated to make manufacturing service transactions among makers more trustworthy. Based on an automated execution mechanism of smart contracts among makers, a decentralized manufacturing network can be enabled for automating transactions among makers, as well as third-party verification of product lifecycle through a trail of historic events. A Makerchain Decentralized Application (DApp) is presented to demonstrate the proposed approach through which clustered makers can self-organizing themselves around personalized demands.

Trends and Perspectives of Sustainable Product Design for Open Architecture Products: Facing the Circular Economy Model

The purpose of this paper is to perform the analysis of literature review regarding the design of open architecture products (OAP) and their potential benefits within the circular economy (CE) model. The analysis involved studying more than 80 research articles during the last two decades in engineering journals. The articles were gathered through a bibliometric analysis using the most relevant keywords concerning product design, sustainability, OAP, and CE. Main trends, challenges and future scopes of research opportunities and development were identified. The study provides a framework to designers and researchers involved in the design of OAP to enhance their sustainability performance for a CE model, which integrates lifecycle considerations (reuse, remanufacturing, repair, and recycle), resource optimization, and emissions reduction. The findings include the need for design methods focused on the design of OAP to guarantee an effective circularity of resources during the whole lifecycle of products and the need of integrating manufacturing processes and material analysis to design products capable of adapting to the CE model.

Optimal Configuration Design of Open Architecture Products Considering Product Adaptability and Diversity of Modules

Product diversity and market competition have led the demand for open architecture products. To meet the low cost and personalization requirements of customers, modules of the open architecture product usually consist of common modules and customized modules, as well as personalized modules and unknown add-on modules with open interfaces. In order to reasonably utilize existing modules according to user requirements, the product adaptability should be addressed in the configuration design of open architecture products. This research proposes an optimal design method of module configuration for open architecture products considering product adaptability and diversity of modules. In this research, new methods are developed for unified modeling of different modules for open architecture products, selection of candidate modules with different life cycle stages, evaluation of adaptability of candidate configurations, and optimization based on genetic algorithms. The effectiveness and feasibility of the method are verified by the design of friction stitch welding machine family with open architectures.

The Development Strategy of Open architecture Products

The Development Strategy of Open architecture Products

Functional characterisation of mechanical joints to facilitate its selection during the design of open architecture products

New trends in product design require the use of modularity as key feature aimed to improve functional performance and the generation of open architecture products. For mechanical systems, one of the challenges during early design stages of these products involves the proper selection of joining methods among their constructive components. A robust joint selection process must consider product requirements, life cycle analysis and eventual procedures for assembly and disassembly. However, the general approach towards a Design-for-Assembly (DFA)/Design-for-Disassembly (DFD) only considers design, manufacturing and in some cases final disposal stage. Additionally, most of the works found in the literature are merely focused on assembly operations, disregarding economic and environmental benefits from optimising disassembly complexity. Herein, a functional characterisation of mechanical joint methods for the assembly and disassembly activities that take place throughout the product life cycle is proposed, focusing on open architecture products. Additionally, a classification of joining methods, a joint complexity metric valuation and a selection process are proposed for the conceptual design stage. The approach integrates both DFA and DFD principles in a formal methodology. The proposed selection roadmap can be implemented to increase product sustainability positively regarding resources optimisation, operational time and costs in reuse, remanufacturing and recycling tasks.

Development of a metric to assess the complexity of assembly/disassembly tasks in open architecture products

This paper describes two metrics to measure the complexity involved in assembly and disassembly tasks for open architecture products during its use phase. The approach proposed is based on the summary of all tasks required to assemble and disassemble a predefined set of modules to generate several product variants, which comprise different working levels or functionalities. The aim of the method is to provide a useful tool to designers in the analysis of product complexity regarding use and further phases in which the assembly and disassembly of modules are required. The benefits and usefulness of the metrics are oriented to enhance the sustainability performance of products through the measurement of complexity in modular systems for the decision-making during the design stage. The reduction of complexity involves significant benefits in all lifecycle phases of product, especially when the user or customer is responsible for many related tasks (maintenance, upgrading, reconfiguration and final disposal of modules). The metrics and their calculation process are illustrated using two case study products.

Methods and tools for the optimal adaptable design of open-architecture products

Adaptable design has the potential to improve product competitiveness through meeting customers’ needs in the product life cycle. Design of open-architecture products has been proposed using the adaptable design method with open and adaptable as well as standard interfaces. Effective tools are required for engineers to apply the concept and approaches of the adaptable design in their daily design processes. This research proposes an optimization method of the adaptable design for open-architecture products. Mathematical models and algorithms considering both adaptability and openness have been developed to identify an optimal design of the adaptable product configuration considering the existing modules and products. An integrated system framework and optimization methods have been implemented as a cyber-enabled tool for the adaptable design of open-architecture products to enable users and vendors to participate in the product development processes using open, adaptable, and standard interfaces. Design of an industrial product was carried out to verify the proposed methods and tools. The system usability, effectiveness, and efficiency were also evaluated.

Enhancing interface adaptability of open architecture products

Open architecture products are built with the platform and open interfaces where different add-on modules from various sources can be connected to meet individualized customers’ requirements. Since add-on modules from different vendors are interacted with the product platform through the interfaces, enhancing the interface adaptability to facilitate interactions between the platform and add-on modules is critical for the development of open architecture products. In this work, an approach of open interface modeling is proposed based on parts and their assembling relationships. The quantification of the open interface is introduced with functional, structural, manufacturing, and operational adaptabilities. The developed analytical approach can enhance the interface adaptability of open architecture products. An example is provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the developed method.

Improvement of user experience using virtual reality in open-architecture product design

User experience has a significant impact on the effective product design and improvement, especially for a personalized product to meet user’s individual need. The development of personalized products requires data from user experience in the evaluation of the product function and performance. The existing methods of Internet-based interactive platforms and direct market user surveys cannot provide users full experience of product features. This research proposes a user interactive system based on virtual reality technologies to provide users a close-real experience in the development of open-architecture products. The system provides users an interface built on the virtual environment. The users can review a product design by virtually operating and evaluating the product. The system records users’ operations and feedbacks for designers to improve the product. Food trucks designed using the open-architecture concept are used as applications to verify the proposed method. A user survey is conducted to examine the system effectiveness.

Assembly sequence planning for open-architecture products

Open-architecture products (OAPs) meet users’ personalized requirements using functional modules and adaptable interfaces in the products. Although different methods have been proposed for product assembly planning, there is a lack of methods for OAPs considering both levels of assembly operations for product modules and components in products. This paper proposes a product structure graph and an assembly constraint matrix to represent constraints of product modules and components in OAPs for assembly sequence planning. Modules in OAPs are first examined for their feasibility to be assembled independently in an operation. If a module cannot be assembled as a sub-assembly, it will be divided into several sub-assembles or components with a revised product hierarchical structure graph. Assembly sequences of components in the module are planned based on the assembly constraint matrix of the components. The feasible assembly sequences of modules and components can then be formed. The proposed methods are verified in the application of an industrial product.

Evaluation of open-architecture product adaptability using quantitative measures

ABSTRACTOpen architecture provides a sustainable product framework for the mass personalized production with features of adaptability and upgradability. Open-architecture products (OAPs) can support the product change to meet users’ requirements in the product life time. A typical OAP would consist of common platforms, add-on modules and public interfaces. The add-on modules include known functional modules at the product development stage and unknown modules to meet the need of the product change in the future. A product open index is proposed in this paper to measure the adaptability of OAPs in their life time. The measures are qualitative for the performance evaluation of OAPs. The evaluation process includes the representation and quantitative measures of product technical factors. Based on the structure of OAPs in product platforms, modules and interfaces, three key technical indicators, namely compatibility of platform, life cycle of modularity, and openness of interface are proposed to evaluate the...

A VR-based Interactive System to Improve Users’ Involvement in OAP Development

Open-architecture products (OAPs) allow users to add personalized functional modules in an original product to meet changeable requirements for the product. The development of personalized products requires users’ involvement to meet the users’ needs effectively. The existing methods of Internet-based interactive platforms and direct market user surveys cannot provide users full experience of product features. This research proposes a virtual reality (VR)-based interactive system to improve users’ involvement in OAPs development. The system consists of a user interactive interface, a product model-processing module, a function execution module, a data recording and process analyzing module. Users operate the product model in the VR environment to experience the product. A soft-bag folding machine designed using the OAP concept is used in a case study to verify the proposed method.

Precedence Constraint Knowledge-based Assembly Sequence Planning for Open-Architecture Products

This paper discusses feasible assembly sequences for Open-architecture products (OAPs). A structure diagram of OAPs and a product assembly constraint matrix are proposed to represent the precedence constraint knowledge among parts and modules. Considering that an independent functional module may not be independent in its spatial structure, a module of OAPs is first evaluated for its possibility to be assembled as a single sub-assembly. If it cannot be assembled as a sub-assembly, it will be divided into several sub-assembles or parts to adjust the product hierarchical graph. Combining with module types of OAPs, feasible assembly sequences of modules and parts are finally generated using the hierarchical precedence method. An industrial paper-folding machine is used as an example to verify the proposed method.

Adaptable design of open architecture products with robust performance

Adaptable design is an approach to design adaptable products whose modules/configurations and parameter values can be changed during an operation stage to satisfy different customer requirements. An open architecture product is an adaptable product with open interfaces to allow the third-party vendors to develop new add-on modules and connect these add-on modules through the open interfaces. In this work, an open architecture adaptable product is modelled by a platform, alternative add-on modules, and open interfaces to connect the add-on modules with the platform. Both the specific add-on modules that need to be designed at the product development stage and the unknown add-on modules that could be added in the future are considered. In this research, a novel robust design approach is introduced to identify the optimal design of an open architecture adaptable product whose functional performance measures are the least sensitive to variations of the product and operating parameters due to uncertainties. First, characteristics of open architecture adaptable products are discussed. Methods for modelling of platform, add-on modules, and open interfaces are then introduced. A multi-level optimisation method is subsequently explained to identify the optimal design configuration and parameters considering product performance measures and their variations.

Adaptable Interface Design for Open-architecture Products

ABSTRACTIncreasing needs for personalized products in the market require the changeability of product functions and users' involvement in the product implementation. Open-architecture products (OAPs) allow changes of product functions by adding or replacing functional modules in products' original structure. OAPs can therefore support the product adaptability to meet user's requirements in the product life cycle. Interfaces connect functional modules of OAPs playing an important role in the product operation and maintenance when upgrading and replacing modules. Adaptable design (AD) provides the concept for the development of OAPs' modules and interfaces. Adaptable interfaces support the module replacement in the life cycle of OAPs. This research applies the AD concept to generate alternative plans of interfaces. The plans are evaluated for an optimal solution using the function correlation matrix, morphologic and fuzzy logic analyses. The design importance is ranked based on interface types, user require...

Open-architecture products

This paper defines open-architecture products (OAPs), a new class of products comprising a fixed platform and modules that can be added and swapped. Customers can adapt OAPs to their needs by integrating modules into the platform. Manufacturers will produce these platforms, while new small companies and customers will develop the modules, thus increasing employment and causing the economy to flourish. At the same time OAPs will provide consumers with the product they desire. Challenges include developing new OAP design software for non-professional designers and new assembly systems to facilitate economical assembly of a large number of product variants.