Deriving a systematic approach to changeable manufacturing system design

It has long been argued that Factories are long life and complex products. The complexity of designing factories, and their underlying manufacturing systems, is further amplified when dealing with continuously changing customer demands. At the same time, due to research fragmentation, little if any scientific explanations are available supporting and exploiting the paradigm that "factories are products". In order to address this weakness, this paper presents research results arising from a comparative analysis of systematic "product design" and "manufacturing system design" approaches. The contribution emerging from this research is an integrated systematic design approach to changeable manufacturing systems, based on scientific concepts founded upon product design theories, and is explained through a case study in the paper. This research is part of collaboration between the CERU University of Malta and IAO Fraunhofer aimed at developing a digital decision support tool for planning changeable manufacturing systems.peer-reviewe

A case for assisting ‘product family’ manufacturing system designers

Manufacturing system design is a complex and demanding activity and the system designer has to take many factors into consideration during the development process including the demand and technological requirements of the products or product families. Central to this activity is the synthesis decision making process, during which the designer defines the elements that will make up the manufacturing system. This research identifies in the decision making process a critical activity and contributes a phenomena that can be used by a framework to support designers to address complex issues such as changeability and the evolution of products over the manufacturing system life-cycle.This research work was partially funded through an ERDF Project (Project No. ERDF083). The first and second authors would therefore like to thank the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST) who is administering this project.peer-reviewe

'Form Design For Emotion' with a Cameraphone Based Tool

Merging emotional value into products has become an essential strategy for increasing a product’s competitive edge in the consumer market. Indeed, this approach instills emotional value into products, to satisfy human emotional needs. Combined with this is the fact that designers usually work outside their design office using pen and paper, since ideas are usually stimulated. Yet, designers lack mobile computer-aided sketching (CAS) tools which truly link paper-based sketching with computer-based 3D modelling tools. As a step in this direction, this poster presents a framework that extends CAS technology to cameraphones. Furthermore, this framework is capable of providing emotional guidance about a form concept to satisfy the emotional needs of the customer, directly on cameraphones. A proof-of-concept tool has been implemented and evaluated. Preliminary evaluation results with design engineers in the cosmetic cases industry, indicate the positive impact that technology based on the framework developed will have on DFe in practice

Design for micro milling guidelines

Miniaturisation of parts is emerging as an important approach to satisfy modern industrial and customer needs. Micro milling is one of the basic micromachining technologies used toproduce miniaturised components. It differs from conventional machining in that the handling and machining of very small features generates various problems. As a consequence, designers need to consider such problems during design to make micromilling more feasible. More emphasis thus needs to be placed on deriving design know-how from the other product life-phases. This paper reports the work undertaken by the Department of Manufacturing within the University of Malta to generate a set of Design for Micromilling (DFμM) guidelines that can contribute to the development to intelligent CAD for this domain.peer-reviewe

Towards intelligent early form design and prototyping, questionnaire results and analysis

Currently, the Department of Manufacturing Engineering (DME), University of Malta and the Istitito per la Matematica Applicata e Tecnologie Informatiche (IMATI), Genoa are conducting research on how simple components represented by sketches on normal paper can be converted to computer models. One of the key issues in developing a sketch recognition system is precisely to handle the trade-off between ease of computer recognition and the preservation of sketching freedom. With an attempt to address this issue, two sketching methods (or sketching languages) have been developed by the DME. This report presents the results of a questionnaire about the sketching activity itself and also about the two proposed sketching languages. An analysis of the results obtained is also presented with the scope to identify what should be the future directions that might contribute to enhance the usefulness of the two sketching approaches

A conceptual framework to assess effectiveness in wheelchair provision

Background: Currently, inadequate wheelchair provision has forced many people with disabilities to be trapped in a cycle of poverty and deprivation, limiting their ability to access education, work and social facilities. This issue is in part because of the lack of collaboration among various stakeholders who need to work together to design, manufacture and deliver such assistive mobility devices. This in turn has led to inadequate evidence about intervention effectiveness, disability prevalence and subsequent costeffectiveness that would help facilitate appropriate provision and support for people with disabilities. Objectives: In this paper, we describe a novel conceptual framework that can be tested across the globe to study and evaluate the effectiveness of wheelchair provision. Method: The Comparative Effectiveness Research Subcommittee (CER-SC), consisting of the authors of this article, housed within the Evidence-Based Practice Working Group (EBP-WG) of the International Society of Wheelchair Professionals (ISWP), conducted a scoping review of scientific literature and standard practices used during wheelchair service provision. The literature review was followed by a series of discussion groups. Results: The three iterations of the conceptual framework are described in this manuscript. Conclusion: We believe that adoption of this conceptual framework could have broad applications in wheelchair provision globally to develop evidence-based practices. Such a perspective will help in the comparison of different strategies employed in wheelchair provision and further improve clinical guidelines. Further work is being conducted to test the efficacy of this conceptual framework to evaluate effectiveness of wheelchair service provision in various settings across the globe

An approach exploiting the interplay between elicited emotions and product design to improve business competitiveness

The elicitation of a human emotion, may be regarded as a consequence of the interaction between the human individual and the properties of the designed system. In addition, elicited emotions have a capacity to influence the behavior of the individual experiencing them. Research into product design and emotions has so far exploited the interplay between the emotions elicited from customers and their purchase behavior, in order to improve business competitiveness. Yet this relatively new area of research, has been limited to the consideration of human-product interactions that take place during the use phase. The research work presented in this paper extends the notion of human-product interactions across the entire life-cycle of the product. In addition to customers, the research work considers the emotions elicited from human life-phase workers who interact with the artefact during phases which precede and follow the use phase. The paper contributes with an approach which is intended to support design teams in eliciting desirable emotions from both workers and customers. The motivation behind this approach is that the competitiveness of a business can be further improved, by exploiting the interplay between the elicited emotions and the change in human behavior across multiple life-cycle phases.peer-reviewe

Towards life-oriented evaluation support of ‘interface concepts’

The evaluation of design concepts is a critical early design stage with potential ramifications on subsequent lifecycle phases. During this stage the engineering designer is typically required to evaluate multiple concepts with respect to conflicting criteria. Over the years academic research proposed numerous concept evaluation techniques in order to support the user at this critical stage. Yet this has yielded an additional problem in which the inexperienced user needs also to be guided in the selection of the appropriate concept evaluation technique. The research presented in this paper has the long-term objective of providing computer support to the user on 2 levels: the evaluation of design concepts and the selection of the appropriate concept appraisal technique. The research, presented in this paper focuses on the development of an approach for the evaluation of module interface design concepts.peer-reviewe

An ‘engustrial design’ experiential education approach

The aim of this paper is to introduce the EngUstrial Design education approach integrating ENGineering and indUSTRIAL design aspects used by the authors at the University of Malta. This approach is aimed at addressing the goal of educating mechanical engineers that are able to comfortably engage in both numeric and artistic activities. This paper discloses our challenges to implementing such an approach together with our emerging experiences in providing bachelor level design education at the University of Malta. Based on case-study observations, this paper outlines a number of lessons learnt that can be exploited by others interested in developing an EngUstrial Design training curriculum to help breed individuals that have a mix of both numeric intensive as well artistic design capabilities.peer-reviewe

Mapping design theory into industrial applications : best practices from Malta

Industry is keen on employing well trained design professionals. The ability of being able ‘to map’ theoretical design knowledge into practical design applications is one of the best ways by which graduates can be measured when being shortlisted for design related jobs. Achieving this type of 'academic formation' however requires an educational programme specifically structured towards cultivating this ‘mapping ability’. This paper describes the engineering educational programme that has evolved over a period of more than 10 years at the University of Malta (UOM), precisely designed towards achieving this ‘mapping ability’. Like many small island states, Malta’s economy is very sensitive to its ability to have knowledge based workers. Over the years, successive governments were being advised to shift towards designing and manufacturing. This motivated the authors to phase-in the ‘DT2P’ (Design Theory to Practice) model of design education, based on the integration of the basic design cycle and the Integrated Product Development model.peer-reviewe