Identifying Reasons for a Lack of Method Application in Engineering Design Practice – An Interview Study

Design methods are seldom used in engineering design practice. The presented study aims at finding the alternative strategies for situations with a need for methodological support. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with ten experienced design engineers to identify causes of and strategies for those situations. Three strategy clusters could be identified: generating information, experience and method application. As the individual\u27s and the team\u27s experience compete with the application of methods, they are seen as reasons for a lack of method application

Making the tacit explicit: Developing tools to support collaboration during industrial design and engineering design practice

Industrial designers employ an extensive range of media and techniques at various times during professional practice. Whilst general patterns of use are acknowledged, such as loose sketches at the beginning of product development and full prototypes at the end, the nuances of use for specific design representations remain elusive. Having identified problems in communication during product development, the researchers identified a lack of understanding in the use of design representations as a key issue. This paper reports on research to enhance communication during product development by making tacit knowledge on the use of design representations explicit. This was achieved through the development of two design tools called CoLab and iD Cards. Phase 1 of the project identified barriers to communication through semi-structured interviews with 61 industrial designers and engineering designers at 17 industrial design consultancies. Phase 2 explored the nature of design representations and categorized 35 types as sketches, drawings, models or prototypes using isemi-structured interviews with both industrial designers and engineering designers, with differences in use between the two groups becoming apparent. Phase 3 used a process of information design to translated the findings and data from Phase 2 into the card-based CoLab design tool that included the taxonomy and indication of when the design representations were used by industrial designers and engineering designers and for what types of information. Changes were made after appraisal and the final tool was validated through semi-structured interviews with 43 industrial design and engineering design practitioners and observation. Phase 4 disseminated the research output with the support of the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAE) in the UK (CoLab web-based design tool) and Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) in the USA (iD Cards physical design tool). The paper concludes that the use of appropriate research methods that integrate literature based sources with practitioner engagement has the potential to elicit valuable and unexpected tacit knowledge. It also acknowledges that whilst the outcomes from such research can be enthusiastically received, translation into a format for effective dissemination can be a challenging and time-consuming process. However, with confidence in outcomes and a desire to disseminate, opportunities can be identified if researchers are prepared to be flexible and adapt to stakeholder needs

Insight into High-quality Aerodynamic Design Spaces through Multi-objective Optimization

An approach to support the computational aerodynamic design process is presented and demonstrated through the application of a novel multi-objective variant of the Tabu Search optimization algorithm for continuous problems to the aerodynamic design optimization of turbomachinery blades. The aim is to improve the performance of a specific stage and ultimately of the whole engine. The integrated system developed for this purpose is described. This combines the optimizer with an existing geometry parameterization scheme and a well- established CFD package. The system’s performance is illustrated through case studies – one two-dimensional, one three-dimensional – in which flow characteristics important to the overall performance of turbomachinery blades are optimized. By showing the designer the trade-off surfaces between the competing objectives, this approach provides considerable insight into the design space under consideration and presents the designer with a range of different Pareto-optimal designs for further consideration. Special emphasis is given to the dimensionality in objective function space of the optimization problem, which seeks designs that perform well for a range of flow performance metrics. The resulting compressor blades achieve their high performance by exploiting complicated physical mechanisms successfully identified through the design process. The system can readily be run on parallel computers, substantially reducing wall-clock run times – a significant benefit when tackling computationally demanding design problems. Overall optimal performance is offered by compromise designs on the Pareto trade-off surface revealed through a true multi-objective design optimization test case. Bearing in mind the continuing rapid advances in computing power and the benefits discussed, this approach brings the adoption of such techniques in real-world engineering design practice a ste

Conservative buffering of approximate nonlinear constraints

In engineering design practice behavior is usually predicted based on some known nominal design. However, when the design is fabricated it will differ from the nominal design because of manufacturing tolerances. In order to generate nominal designs that will still satisfy behavior constraints in the presence of manufacturing tolerances, engineers resort to the use of safety factors, over and above those introduced to account for other uncertainties (e.g., in load conditions, material properties, analysis modeling). The accurate selection of the values of these manufacturing tolerances safety factors is dependent on the capability of the engineer to determine the sensitivity of the critical constraints to changes in the design variables. This process usually leads to overly conservative designs. The task of choosing safety factors is much more difficult in structural synthesis because: (1) it is not known which constraints will be active at the final design, (2) as the design changes during the synthesis process the sensitivities of the constraints with respect to the design variables also change, and (3) the imposition of the safety factors themselves may change the set of critical constraints. These difficulties can be overcome with the approximation concepts approach to structural synthesis by buffering the approximate constraints with quantities that are related to the design variable tolerances and the accurate sensitivities of the constraints with respect to the design variable. Designs generated by this approach tend to be feasible but not overly conservative

Perancangan Dan Pembuatan Alat Bantu Pencekaman Untuk Mesin Mortiser

The technology that growing rapidly increasing custom product demand. On the other hand, support the technology mostly has limitations in operation. This resulted in an inability to accommodate overall the technology needs and the impact on the delay of the manufacturing process. In the production process Industrial Engineering Design Practice 1 at the Industrial Engineering Department, Muhammadiyah University of Surakarta, where one production machine that Mortiser machine can not be used optimally because of the size of the workpiece to be processed is not ideal for existing clamping system. This prompted the researchers to make modifications to the clamping system. Modifications made by considering the dimensions of the workpiece to be processed, the process is done by machines Mortiser, the technical aspects of designing production tools, as well as the availability of tools and material support. Tools designed clamping expected to overcome problems Mortiser machining process on the machine, allowing the machine operator to run the machining process, and increase efficiency

An on-line advisor for sizing and economic analysis of anaerobic digestion plants

A web-based service was deployed to appropriately size bio-gas plant capacity and perform its economic viability and return on investment based on biomass availability.  The tool is based on accepted biogas plant engineering design practice, incorporating the effects of incentives resulting from energy policies for member nations of the European Union participating in the Bioenergy Farm IEE and EU funded project.  The service provides a comprehensive database that allows consultants and farmers to analyze anaerobic digestion systems at different levels of granularity.  It also included multilingual support.  An adoption program was conducted to increase awareness on the availability of the service and ensure appropriate use and interpretation of its results.  Since its deployment, the tool has been frequently used by consultants and farmers.  The advisor was used to conduct over 3000 sizing and analysis of biogas production plants and completely fulfill all project targets.   Keywords: Bioenergy, feasibility, viability, subsidy, web application, fre

An on-line advisor for sizing and economic analysis of anaerobic digestion plants

A web-based service was deployed to appropriately size bio-gas plant capacity and perform its economic viability and return on investment based on biomass availability.  The tool is based on accepted biogas plant engineering design practice, incorporating the effects of incentives resulting from energy policies for member nations of the European Union participating in the Bioenergy Farm IEE and EU funded project.  The service provides a comprehensive database that allows consultants and farmers to analyze anaerobic digestion systems at different levels of granularity.  It also included multilingual support.  An adoption program was conducted to increase awareness on the availability of the service and ensure appropriate use and interpretation of its results.  Since its deployment, the tool has been frequently used by consultants and farmers.  The advisor was used to conduct over 3000 sizing and analysis of biogas production plants and completely fulfill all project targets.   Keywords: Bioenergy, feasibility, viability, subsidy, web application, fre

Shear Deflection of Composite Wood Beams

Shear deflection of wood beams usually is not included in design calculations. Ignoring shear deflection could lead to significant errors in total beam deflection predictions, especially for composite wood beams that have less and/or lower quality material in the core (or web) as compared to the outer zones (flanges).A generalized shear deflection equation was developed for layered composite beams. The model can accommodate variable numbers of laminations, nonprismatic shapes, and variable elastic properties between laminations and along the beam length. The model was validated using full-sized glued-laminated timber beam test data. Sensitivity analyses were conducted on numerical integration step sizes, ratio of modulus of elasticity to shear modulus, and span-to-depth ratio (L/d). One important finding was that the common engineering design practice of not including shear deflection for solid-sawn wood beams with L/d ratios of 15 to 25 could lead to significant errors for composite wood beams

Teaching and Assessing Engineering Design Thinking with Virtual Internships and Epistemic Network Analysis

An engineering workforce of sufficient size and quality is essential for addressing significant global challenges such as climate change, world hunger, and energy demand. Future generations of engineers will need to identify challenging issues and design innovative solutions. To prepare young people to solve big and increasingly global problems, researchers and educators need to understand how we can best educate young people to use engineering design thinking. In this paper, we explore virtual internships, online simulations of 21st-century engineering design practice, as one method for teaching engineering design thinking. To assess the engineering design thinking, we use epistemic network analysis (ENA), a tool for measuring complex thinking as it develops over time based on discourse analysis. The combination of virtual internships and ENA provides opportunities for students to engage in authentic engineering design, potentially receive concurrent feedback on their engineering design thinking, and develop the identity, values, and ways of thinking of professional engineers