22-10-2009, 02:48 PM
CONCURRENT ENGINEERING
With the latest development due to globalization, business unit may have the capacity to deal with the increasing competition. This is possible only by drastic organizational productivity improvement. One of the tools to achieve the organizational productivity improvement is called Concurrent Engineering. If there is a delay of three months in bringing a product to the market, it would cause an enormous loss to the organization by way of reduced market share.
A systematic approach to the integrated, concurrent design of products and to their related implementation, including operational aspects, whereby designers/ developers process simultaneously and since go ahead, all requirements of the product life cycle, from concept through delivery, includingquality, cost, schedule and user requirements.
Concurrent Engineering, also called parallel or simultaneous engineering, is a new philosophy, viewed by most corporations as a means to competitive, world class manufacturing. It strives to do the right job the first time. It results from the synthesizing the two fundamental observations which are given below:
1. The changes become more costly , and these changes are incorporated in the project later.
2. Performing different steps of a project in parallel, would complete the project more quickly than executing the steps sequentially, one after the another.
Therefore concurrent engineering can be defined as:
1) A philosophy of product development: Integrating multiple design issues
2) A method of product design: Integration of multidisciplinary folks into the design team
3) A method to lead people: Design issues are represented in the people
4) It is not the over the wall
TRADITIONAL ENGINEERING VS. CONCURRENT ENGINEERING
In traditional engineering a relatively short time is spent defining the product. A relatively long time is spent designing the product and a surprisingly long time is often spent redesigning the product. The key to shortening the overall design time is to better the product and better document the design process.
Traditionally, the development of a product had been seen as a cycle of plan...do...check...act...(adjust). Concurrent engineering is a process in which appropriate disciplines are committed to work interactively to conceive, approve, develop, and implement product programs that meet pre-determined objectives define
Example of design changes as a function of time for an American and Japanese automobile. Source: Engineering Modeling and Design, Chapman, Bahill & Wymore (see reference 1.A).
This is the relatively recent term which is applied to the engineering design philosophy of cross-functional cooperation in order to create products which are better, cheaper, and more quickly brought to market. This new trend reunites technical and non technical disciplines such as engineering, marketing and accounting. Always focusing on satisfying the customer, these representatives work together in defining the product to be manufactured.
Various organizations follow a plethora of product and process development cycle. Characterizing the phases of the product development cycle helps to put in perspective some of the organizational issues involved. The phases are:
1. Mission statement: it is also known as design brief or charter. I should contain a general description of the product, target market segments, and the customer categories and specify business goals so as to market share, profit margins and the productâ„¢s projected life cycle.
2. Market and concept definition: Consumers demands are identified by various market survey techniques; benchmark studies are conducted, the functional technical design requirement are identified, design and manufacturing feasibility is determined and cost estimates are projected.
3. System level concept generation and selection: various design concepts that satisfy the functional design requirements are generated. Design satisfying these requirements in terms of quality, cost and delivery is selected and the product architecture is determined.
Development time
Start Date Launch Date
4. Detailed product design: Detailed specification of product dimensions , materials and tolerances are made. Special and standard components are identified & make or buy decisions are made.
5. Prototype testing and refinement: prototypes of the selected design are tested for functionality, manufacturing and assembly feasibility, reliability & cost.
6. Process planning , Production planning and Control: Actual production processes of the final deign are planned. Production control and quality assurance plans are drawn up.
7. Production Ramp-up and Refinement: in this final phase a pilot production is run is carried out with the purpose of familiarizing and the training the workforce, discovering the correcting production problems before full production level s are reached. Subsequently, the product is launched.
