A new way to solve tolerance analysis: the Cassino Unified Tolerance Analysis tool

ABSTRACT

In the last 30 years, many research works were carried out on the tolerance analysis. Historically, tolerance analysis of rigid assemblies was always separated by that of compliant assemblies. In this work, a new tool is proposed, aiming to numerically execute a tolerance analysis without making distinction between rigid and complaint assemblies. The Cassino Unified Tolerance Analysis (CaUTA) tool is based on general purpose software packages, and it allows to take into account the manufacturing signature on the surfaces of the parts constituting the assembly, i.e. the geometrical deviations from the nominal of the surfaces belonging to the assembly parts due to the adopted manufacturing process. The new tool was used to solve a real application as a 2D or 3D problem; the effects of form deviations and of part mechanical behaviour on the assembly stack-up result were considered by using a manufacturing signature model to generate the features with geometric deviations and the Finite Element Analysis (FEA) to analyse the stresses, strains and displacements. Finally, the CaUTA tool was validated by comparing the results with those due to a method of the literature.

KEYWORDS:

• Tolerance analysis
• assembly
• finite element analysis
• manufacturing signature

Acknowledgements

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.