Katharina Albrecht

Smart Engineering for Smart Products

Smart Engineering aims at a new approach for describing, designing and dimensioning Smart Products. Design methodology is far advanced and provides both a systematic approach to develop new products as well as appropriate methods to support development tasks in specific development phases. Within this development process the communication capabilities of Smart Products, the structure of communication among Smart Products as well as executing functional operations triggered by communicated messages is not described yet.

Automated Import of XML-Files Containing Optimized Geometric Data to 3D-CAD-Models of Non-Linear Integral Bifurcated Sheet Metal Parts

The Collaborative Research Centre 666 has the focus on researching fundamental new methods for the development of optimized products and production processes for integral bifurcated sheet metal parts. Technological innovations have been achieved with respect to new production processes such as linear flow splitting and linear bend splitting as well as to produce products with flexible profiles.The use of state of art product development methodologies can be applied but these are not optimized to deal with the high complexity of the requirements and properties of integral bifurcated sheet metal products. In order to deal with that complexity a new approach of a product development methodology, the algorithm based product development process, has been established. Within the scope of the algorithm based product development methodology a topology optimization, based on mathematical algorithms using product requirements information, is already applied in the conceptual steps of product development process. By using this methodological approach an optimized concept of bifurcated sheet metal can be determined. The results are stored as optimized geometric data in XML-format files. 3D-CAD-Models are generated based on these data.However the import of these data into 3D-CAD-Systems are not fully automated. The developed data model, from earlier works for linear flow splitting and linear bend splitting, does not take into account the variability of the profiles in the third-dimension. In addition the topology optimization does not provide production-orientated design requirements and therefore it does not take into account the production process limits (of linear flow splitting and linear bend splitting). Hence 3D-CAD-Models resulting from the optimized geometric data need to be adapted manually.Therefore new advanced approaches in terms of virtual product development tools need to be explored. This paper describes the development of an interface within the CAD-System Siemens NX which supports the automatic import of XML-files containing the optimized geometric data of non-linear integral bifurcated sheet metal in 3D-CAD-Models. The existing data model is extended considering the requirements of the developed interface in order to represent nonlinear bifurcated profiles. An approach of the interface using the described data model and the NX Open API is introduced and explained.Copyright

The Result: A New Design Paradigm

One of the key challenges faced by engineers is finding, concretizing, and optimizing solutions for a specific technical problem in the context of requirements and constraints (Pahl et al. 2007). Depending on the technical problem’s nature, specifically designed products and processes can be its solution with product and processes depending on each other. Although products are usually modeled within the context of their function, consideration of the product’s life cycle processes is also essential for design. Processes of the product’s life cycle concern realization of the product (e.g., manufacturing processes), processes that are realized with the help of the product itself (e.g., use processes) and processes at the end of the product’s life cycle (recycling or disposal). Yet, not just product requirements have to be considered during product development, as requirements regarding product life cycle processes need to be taken into account, too. Provision for manufacturing process requirements plays an important role in realizing the product’s manufacturability, quality, costs, and availability (Chap. 3). Further life cycle demands, such as reliability, durability, robustness, and safety, result in additional product and life cycle process requirements. Consequently, the engineer’s task of finding optimal product and process solutions to solve a technical problem or to fulfill a customer need is characterized by high complexity, which has to be handled appropriately (Chaps. 5 and 6).

Computer-Integrated Engineering and Design

Virtual product development aims at the use of information modeling techniques and computer-aided (CAx-) tools during the product development process, to represent the real product digitally as an integrated product model (Anderl and Trippner 2000). Thereby, data related to the product as well as product properties are generated and stored as result of the product development process (e.g., product planning, conceptual design) (Pahl et al. 2007; VDI 2221 1993). Within virtual product development CAx process chains have been established. They comprise the concatenating of the applied tools and technologies within the steps of the virtual product development process enabling the consistent use of product data (Anderl and Trippner 2000). The computer-aided design (CAD) technology aims at the integration of computer systems to support engineers during the design process such as design conceptualization, design, and documentation. It provides the geometry of the design and its properties (e.g., mass properties, tolerances) which is abstracted to be used in computer-aided engineering (CAE) systems (e.g., finite element method (FEM)) for design analysis, evaluation, and optimization. The computer-aided process planning (CAPP) technology provides tools to support process planning, Numerical Control (NC) programming, and quality control (Hehenberger 2011; Lee 1998; Vajna 2009). The advantages are continuous processing and refinement of the product model, minimizing the modeling efforts regarding time as well as costs and avoiding error sources. In addition, all relevant data and information related to the product can be provided for subsequent processing (Anderl and Trippner 2000). CAx technologies have been widely established within the product development processes in industry. They have been further developed in the last years; however efforts to integrate and to automate them are still a topic of research. Especially, with the introduction of innovative manufacturing technologies such as linear flow and bend splitting require new methods and tools for the virtual product development process. These technologies enable the production of a new range of sheet metal products with characteristic properties (e.g., Y-profile geometry, material properties) that are not addressed in state-of-the-art methods and tools.

Web-Based Application for Algorithm Based Product Development Process of Integral Bifurcated Sheet Metal Parts

Within the Collaborative Research Center 666 the algorithm based product development process has been established. It is based on state of the art product development methodologies and enhanced in order to optimize the product development process of integral bifurcated sheet metal parts. Algorithms based on mathematical optimization approaches as well as the initial product requirements and constraints information are applied to obtain an optimized design as CAD-Model. Regarding this methodology there are still some challenges to be solved, such as reduction of iterations steps to elaborate final product design as CAD-model, use of heterogeneous data as well as software and enhancement of information exchange. Therefore, this paper introduces a concept for a web-based application to support the algorithmic product development methodology and CAD modeling in CRC 666. It enables the development and adaptation of integral bifurcated parts based on the initial optimization data provided by XML-files. Besides the description of use cases and use scenarios, the concept is implemented as a web-based application for validation purposes. Based on the validation, advantages and limitations of the presented approach are discussed.

Applying Actual Development Progress Into Education

Todays’ product development process is characterized by an increasing use of embedded software solutions integrated into mechatronic products. The development is more and more translocated into a virtual environment. New software methods and tools have to be developed.Industry 4.0 is an approach to highlight the tendency of modern development. Communication between smart products, communication via internet technologies, cyber-physical systems and the Internet of Things are the basis of Industry 4.0. Owing this development, used project management methodologies have to be adjusted. In special the well-known V-Model is now extended to the W-Model to cope with the new requirements like communications between different disciplines. New approaches in virtual development have to be adapted to modern teaching techniques. Therefore a course for first semester mechanical engineering students is conducted by the department of Computer Integrated Design at the Technische Universitat Darmstadt. Industry 4.0 fundamentals are taught as well as the development process underlying the so called W-Model. The students will apply this knowledge while they participate in exercises. A web-based tutorial is provided every week with different learning packages. With these learning packages, the students learn to use the project management techniques as well as software development techniques to solve different tasks. Later complex data structures and algorithms can be coded and are applied. The software development techniques, established in development of information technologies, gets more important in mechanical engineering. Therefore the students learn these aspects. Over three months length the students work in groups and use all their skills to realize a bigger software-project — a digital factory. They use a virtual testing environment (ViTMeS 3.0) to develop their solution. The presented ViTMeS 3.0 is a further development of a virtual testing environment used in last year’s team work. Later they can test their code with a real life example. This example, the digital factory, built with LEGO Mindstorms, is an important part of teaching students the foundations of communication and information techniques as well as software development and programming skills. The last step of the team work is the coding of a graphical user interface for appropriate visualization.Copyright