Purpose

To find the system with minimum investment and best quality performance that is capable of producing all of the product variants, assessing the complexity of designing assembly system at the early concept stage is an essential step, which helps and instructs a designer to create a product- and system-oriented assembly solution with the least complexity. The purpose of this paper is to propose a quantifying measurement of complexity in the design of a modular automated assembly system.

Design/methodology/approach

The configurable assembly system is becoming a trend, which enables companies to quickly respond to changes caused by different product variants but without a large investment. One of the enabling factors is the availability of modular solutions of assembly modules that can be configured according to different technical requirements. This paper develops a methodology using fuzzy evaluation to calculate the design complexity in the design phase for a modular automatic assembly system. Fuzzy linguistic variables are used to measure the interaction among the influence factors, to deal with the uncertainty of the judgement. The proposed method investigates three matrices to present how the function-based assembly modules, design complexity factors, part attributes and product components, which are regarded as the main influence factors, complicate the construction of a modular assembly system. The design complexity is derived and quantified based on these assessments.

Findings

The proposed approach presents a formal quantification to evaluate the design complexity with regard to a modular assembly system from beginning, which can be identified and used as criteria to indicate the quality of performance and investment cost in advance. A mathematical model based on the fuzzy logic is established to provide both theoretical and practical guidance for the paper. To validate the predictive model, the statistic relationships between the assessed system design complexity, real assembly defect rate and investment cost are estimated based on regression analysis. The application of the presented methodology is demonstrated with regard to a traditional rear drive unit in the automotive industry.

Originality/value

This paper presents a developed method, which addresses the measures of complexity found in the design of a modular assembly system. It would help to run the design process with better resource allocation and cost estimation in a quantitative approach.

中文翻译：

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一种在设计阶段评估模块化自动装配系统设计复杂度的方法

目的

为了找到能够生产所有产品变体的最低投资和最佳质量性能的系统，在早期概念阶段评估设计装配系统的复杂性是必不可少的步骤，这有助于并指导设计师创建产品-和具有最低复杂性的面向系统的装配解决方案。本文的目的是提出模块化自动化装配系统设计中复杂性的量化测量。

设计/方法/方法

可配置的装配系统正在成为一种趋势，它使公司能够快速响应不同产品变体引起的变化，而无需大量投资。促成因素之一是装配模块的模块化解决方案的可用性，可以根据不同的技术要求进行配置。本文开发了一种使用模糊评估来计算模块化自动装配系统设计阶段的设计复杂度的方法。模糊语言变量用于衡量影响因素之间的相互作用，以处理判断的不确定性。所提出的方法研究了三个矩阵，以呈现基于功能的装配模块、设计复杂性因素、零件属性和产品组件如何被视为主要影响因素，使模块化组装系统的构造复杂化。设计复杂性是根据这些评估得出和量化的。

发现

所提出的方法提出了一种正式的量化方法，可以从一开始就评估模块化装配系统的设计复杂性，可以将其识别并用作提前指示性能质量和投资成本的标准。建立基于模糊逻辑的数学模型，为论文提供理论和实践指导。为了验证预测模型，基于回归分析估计评估的系统设计复杂性、实际装配缺陷率和投资成本之间的统计关系。所提出的方法的应用是针对汽车行业中的传统后驱动单元进行的。

原创性/价值

本文介绍了一种开发的方法，该方法解决了模块化装配系统设计中的复杂性度量。这将有助于以定量的方法以更好的资源分配和成本估算来运行设计过程。