Automatic manufacturability evaluation method and system

• US 5,717,598 A
• Filed: 09/22/1995
• Issued: 02/10/1998
• Est. Priority Date: 02/14/1990
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
• Inventors: Ikeda, deceased, Manabu, Iwata, Minoru, Ohashi, Toshijiro, Miyakawa, Seii, Hayakawa, Mitsuharu, Arimoto, Syoji
• Primary Examiner(s): RUGGIERO, JOSEPH F
• Application Number:
  US08/532,980
• Time in Patent Office: 872 Days
• Field of Search: 364/468.01, 364/468.02, 364/468.03, 364/468.09, 364/468.1, 364/474.24, 364/468.05-468.08, 395/207-211, 395/919
• US Class Current: 700/103
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/4097 characterised by using design data to control NC machines, e.g. CAD/CAM G05B19/4093 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/41865 characterised by job scheduling, process planning, material flow
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/31065 Disassembly evaluation
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/32234 Maintenance planning
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/35028 Adapt design as function of manufacturing merits, features, for manufacturing, DFM
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/35193 Manufacturability
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/35199 Processability
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/35212 Estimating a cost associated with each operation, amount of time, target cost
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/50397 Two conveyors transporting together a workpiece to station
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2219/10 Environmental application, e.g. waste reduction, pollution control, compliance with environmental legislation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 30/00 Computer-aided design [CAD]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: Y02P 90/02 Total factory control, e.g. smart factories, flexible manufacturing systems [FMS] or integrated manufacturing systems [IMS]
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 706/919 Designing, planning, programming, CAD, CASE

Abstract

A designed object workability evaluating system for evaluating quantitatively at a stage of designing an article whether a structure of the article as designed can be realized easily in a manufacturing stage for thereby selectively determining a best structure from a plurality of design plans through comparative evaluation thereof. The system includes a client machine section including a guide information generating unit for generating information for guiding operations of a user, an input device for allowing the user to input commands and data and a display unit. A server machine section includes a registering unit storing evaluation elements defined by the user, an index calculating module for calculating indexes indicating degrees of difficulty/ease of work, an evaluation element estimating module, a part workability evaluation module, an article workability evaluation module, and a best design plan selection/determination module.

Claims

1. A designed object workability evaluating system for evaluating quantitatively at a stage of defining an article whether a structure of the article as designed can be realized with easy work in a manufacturing stage, for thereby selectively determining a best structure from a plurality of design plans through comparative evaluation thereof, comprising:

a client machine section including guide information generating means for generating information for guiding operations of a user, input means for allowing the user to input commands and data, and display control means for displaying on a display unit said guide information and results of evaluations performed by said system; and

a server machine section including registering means for registering in storage means evaluation elements defined by the user, storage means for storing information to be used in evaluation processing, index calculating means for calculating indexes indicating degrees of difficulty/easiness of work involved in realizing the evaluation elements already registered in said storage means, evaluation element estimating means for estimating the evaluation elements to be performed on parts comprising an article given by a design plan subjected to evaluation, part workability evaluation means for evaluating ease of work to be performed on the parts, article workability evaluation means for evaluating ease of work involved in realizing said article, and best design plan selection/determination means for selectively determining a best structure from a plurality of design plans through comparative evaluation thereof;

wherein said system is selectively comprised of one client machine section and one server machine section or a plurality of client machine sections and one server machine section interconnected by a communication network.

2. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said guide information generating means generates at least one of:

first guide information for allowing the user to selectively make definition of new evaluation elements or to perform an operation for correcting the registered evaluation element(s) on the basis of the registered evaluation element displayed on said display unit;

second guide information for displaying on said display unit standard conditions of other evaluation elements which have influence on working costs involved in the work to be performed on one registered evaluation element which concerns the user or working time required for the work to be performed on said one registered evaluation element in order to guide the user in inputting one of a working cost or a working time required for the work for performing said one evaluation element on a standard article; and

third guide information for indicating to the user a procedure for inputting evaluation elements to be realized at the manufacturing stage on the individual parts comprising the article given by said design plan subjected to evaluation and selectively commanding one of the evaluation or alternatively a procedure for inputting design data of the object for evaluation from a computer-aided design system and commanding the evaluation.

3. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said input means serves as means for receiving data and commands inputted by the user or design data supplied from a computer-aided design system.

4. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said storage means stores said evaluation elements, the indexes indicating the degrees of difficulty/easiness of said works, real costs and real time involved with the works performed on the evaluation elements while establishing correspondence relations among them.

5. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said registering means serves as means for selectively registering evaluation elements newly defined by the user in said storage means or alternatively correcting the registered evaluation element of which correction is commanded by the user and again selectively registering the corrected evaluation element or alternatively registering real costs and real time involved in the works performed on said evaluation elements, respectively.

6. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said index calculating means calculates indexes indicating degrees of difficulty/easiness of the works involved in realizing said registered evaluation elements on a standard article on the basis of either one of data concerning real costs or real time involved in said works as inputted by the user.

7. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said evaluation element estimating means comprises means for estimating the evaluation elements to be realized in the manufacturing stage on the individual parts comprising the article given by the design plan subjected to evaluation on a part-by-part basis on a basis of commands inputted by the user and design data available from the computer-aided design system.

8. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said part workability evaluation means selectively reads out indexes indicating degrees of difficulty/easiness of works registered in said storage means in correspondence to the registered evaluation elements on a basis of said evaluation elements to be performed on said individual parts as inputted by the user or alternatively generated by said evaluation element estimating means, to thereby calculate part workability evaluation scores indicating degrees of easiness of work to be performed on the individual parts comprising the article given by said design plan.

9. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said article workability evaluation means selectively reads out the indexes indicating degrees of difficulty/easiness of works registered in said storage means in correspondence to the registered evaluation elements basis of said basis of said evaluation elements to be performed on said individual parts inputted by the user or alternatively generated by said evaluation element estimating means, to thereby calculate article workability evaluation scores indicating degrees of ease of work to be performed on the article given by said design plan.

10. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said best design plan selection/determination means compares article workability evaluation scores of said plurality of design plans to thereby selectively determine a structure of the design plan having a highest evaluation score.

11. The designed object workability evaluating system according to claim 1, wherein said display control means outputs guide information generated by the guide information generating means, results of the selective determination, part workability evaluation scores of each of the parts and the article workability evaluation score for the article for display on said display unit.

12. A designed object workability evaluating system for evaluating quantitatively at a stage of designing an article whether a structure of the article as designed can be realized with easy work in a manufacturing stage for thereby selectively determining a best structure from a plurality of design plans through comparative evaluation thereof, comprising:

a client machine section including guide information generating means for generating information for guiding operations of a user, input means for allowing the user to input commands and data and display control means for display on a display unit said guide information and results of evaluations performed by said system; and

a server machine section including registering means for registering in storage means evaluation elements defined by the user, storage means for storing information to be used in evaluation processing, index calculating means for calculating indexes indicating degrees of difficulty/easiness of work involved in realizing the evaluation elements already registered in said storage means, evaluation element estimating means for estimating the evaluation elements to be performed on parts comprising an article given by a design plan subjected to evaluation, part workability evaluation means for evaluating ease of work to be performed on the parts, article workability evaluation means for evaluating ease of work involved in realizing said article, and best design plan selection/determination means for selectively determining a best structure on a basis of comparative evaluation of a plurality of design plans;

wherein said client machine section, said server machine section and a computer-aided design system cooperate to comprise an integral structure of said designed object workability evaluating system.

13. A designed object workability evaluating method for evaluating quantitatively at a stage of designing an article whether a structure of the article as designed can be realized with easy work in a manufacturing stage with the aid of a computer system, comprising:

registration processing for registration in the computer system of an evaluation processing for making evaluations as to ease of work to be performed on an article subjected to evaluation, said registration processing including the steps of;

(I) classifying a plurality of statuses for basic elements of which parts comprising said article that are expected to be subjected to evaluation and inputting though input means at least one value of working costs and working time expected to be involved in the work for processing the part in a standard condition for realizing said basic elements on said part of standard condition together with identification symbols of said basic elements, respectively, while establishing a correspondence between said values and said identification symbols for registration in a storage means;

(ii) classifying plural kinds of status factors which said parts are expected to have in addition to said basic elements and which influence the working costs and working time involved in realization of the basic elements, respectively, into supplementary elements, classifying each of said supplementary elements into one of more statuses, inputting through said input means at least one value of working costs and working time involved in the work to performed so that the part in said standard condition is formed in statuses of the supplementary elements as classified, respectively, to thereby register said supplementary elements in said storage means together with identification symbols of the supplementary element while establishing correspondences between said values and said symbols, respectively;

(iii) determining from said registered basic elements one basic element exhibiting a predetermined status serving as a standard of a standard element while determining one of the statuses classified for each of the registered supplementary elements as a supplementary standard;

(iv) comparing values of working costs or working time of said individual basic elements with reference to a corresponding value of the working cost or working time of said standard element to thereby determine basic elimination scores serving as indexes which indicate a degree of difficulty/easiness of work to be performed on said basic elements, respectively and storing said basic elimination scores while establishing correspondences between said basic elimination scores and the identification symbols, respectively, of the basic individual elements registered in said storage means; and

(v) comparing values of the working costs or working time involved by said classified statuses of said supplementary elements with the corresponding value of the working costs or the working time involved by supplementary standards of said individual supplementary elements to thereby determine supplementary coefficients serving as indexes which indicate the degree of difficulty/easiness of the work involved by the classified statuses of each of said supplementary elements, and storing said supplementary coefficients in said storage means in correspondence with the identification symbols, respectively, of the individual supplementary elements registered in said storage means;

said processing for evaluating the degree of ease of work on the article subject to evaluation including the steps of;

(vi) inputting through the input means identification symbols representing said basic element indicating work to be performed on individual parts of said article in a manufacturing stage and said supplementary elements on a part-by-part basis;

(vii) referencing said storage means on a basis of the identification symbols representing, respectively, the basic elements indicating the works to be performed on the individual parts as inputted and supplementary elements therefor, to thereby read out the corresponding elimination scores and the supplementary coefficients;

(viii) arithmetically determining on the basis of said basic elimination scores and said supplementary coefficients as read out of those part elimination scores serving as indexes indicating the degree of difficulty/easiness of work to be performed on the individual parts, respectively, by selectively comparing the working cost or the working time of the part standard for the individual parts with the working cost or working time expected to be required by the work to be performed on the individual parts;

said part standard having one of said standard elements while said supplementary elements each represent a maximum size and a mass, respectively, having sizes corresponding to said parts, respectively;

(ix) determining part workability evaluation scores representing indexes indicating degrees of ease of the work to be performed on each of the parts by subtracting the value of said part elimination score, respectively, from a predetermined standard value;

(x) determining arithmetically from said calculated part elimination score and an article elimination score which represents an index indicating degree of difficulty/easiness of works to be performed on the article subjected to evaluation by comparing a working cost or a working time of an article standard corresponding to said article subjected to evaluation with a working cost or a working time of said article subjected to evaluation obtained by totaling at least one of the working costs and the working time for the parts comprising said article subjected to evaluation, respectively;

said article standard representing a standard for the article subjected to the evaluation which is assumed to comprise a combination of said part standards;

(xi) determining an article workability evaluation score representing a degree of ease of work to be performed on the article subjected to evaluation by subtracting a value of said article elimination score from a predetermined standard value;

(xii) outputting at least one of said part workability evaluation score and said article workability evaluation score through a display unit;

(xiii) determining either a necessity or unnecessity of improvement of the article subjected to evaluation and a most optimal design plan by comparing a magnitude of the article workability evaluation score of the article subjected to evaluation with that of an article workability evaluation score of an alternative determined through a similar procedure.

14. The design object workability evaluating method according to claim 13,

wherein in said step (iv), index calculating means reads out at least one value of the working costs and the working time of the individual basic elements from said storage means and reads out at least one value of corresponding working cost and working time for said standard element registered in said storage means to thereby determine the basic elimination score serving as an index indicating the degree of difficulty/easiness of the work for the basic element on the basis of a value of a ratio or difference between the value of said standard element as read out and the value of the basic element as read out and registering said basic elimination scores in said storage means, said processing being repeatedly executed for the individual basic elements, respectively;

while in said step (v), said index calculating means reads out from said storage means at least one value of the working cost and the working time in one of the classified statuses of the the individual supplementary elements while reading out at least one value of the corresponding working cost and working time for the supplementary standard registered in said storage means, to thereby determine the supplementary coefficient serving as the index indicating the degree of difficulty/easiness of the work for one of the classified statuses of said supplementary elements, and registers said supplementary coefficient in said storage means, said processing being repetitively executed for the classified statuses of all the supplementary elements, respectively.

15. The designed object workability evaluating method according to claim 13,

wherein said step (ix) is replaced by a step of determining the part workability evaluation scores representing the indexes indicating degrees of ease of the work to be done on the individual parts, respectively, by adding the values of said part elimination scores to the predetermined standard value;

while step (xi) is replaced by a step of determining the article workability evaluation scores representing the indexes indicating degrees of ease of the work to be done on the article subjected to evaluation by adding the value of said article elimination score to the predetermined standard value.