Software for end-of-life disassembly analysis

In recent years, many countries have developed legislations which are aimed to force manufacturers to recycle their products at the end of their life. However, before end-of-life products can be recycled, end-of-life disassembly needs to be in place. It entails large amounts of capital expenditure and time. Besides this, product designers also do not have experience in disassembling and recycling to determine the impact of various design aspects on difficulty at the disassembly stage. Therefore, there is a need for a tool to analyse the disassemblability and recyclability. This paper proposes software named as EDAS to fulfil those needs

Strategic guidance model for product development in relationship with recycling aspects for automative products

This paper discusses a strategic guidance model for the product development process of automotive components in order to fulfil the requirements of the recycling aspects in End-of-Life Vehicle (ELV) Directive. This proposed model will enable automotive designers to assess products for their technical and economic viability at end-of-life. The paper presents an example of the whole vehicle as a case study in order to demonstrate and validate the proposed framework. It argues that indicators from the analysis can be used to inform the strategic development plans of the vehicles, infrastructures and spare part businesses. Based on this concept, a design guidance model is presented in order to help the designer make a right decision in the product development process so that value can be maximised at a product’s end-of-life