Frühzeitiges konstruktionsbegleitendes Toleranzmanagement

Description

Manufacturing-induced variations are inevitable and affect the quality of a product. Therefore, robust design and variation management aim to minimize and control the effects of variations. However, extensive product recalls have shown that this is an increasingly challenging task. Thus, experts recommend virtual validation and an early consideration of variation in the product development process. However, lacking knowledge commonly leads to a late application.

Thus, this thesis proposes a novel approach that empowers product developers to consider variations at an early stage. This early integrated variation management is closely linked to the product development process and unites aspects of quality management, robust design, and variation management. It includes the automated derivation of key characteristics of variation management from product requirements, the structured robustness evaluation and computer-aided robustness synthesis of concepts, and the automated tolerance specification and analysis of preliminary CAD designs. Besides raising awareness among product developers, this approach allows an early integration and automated consideration of variation, thus contributing to shorter development times and improved product quality.