Computer Aided Manufacturability Analysis of Die-cast Parts

Abstract

Automated manufacturability analysis is an important tool with the designer which is meant to incorporate manufacturability aspects at initial stages of design. This paper deals with a system developed for automated manufacturability analysis for die-cast parts. Purpose of this system is to assist designers in their effort to come up with manufacturable die-cast parts economizing in terms of cost and time without compromising with quality and functional requirements. Unlike most of the work done in the past, which concentrates on manufacturability assessment of a part to be machined, the present work deals with die-casting process. This system uses geometric reasoning to extract manufacturing features and other information from a part CAD model. It uses a knowledge base consisting of die-casting process knowledge and rules, to present a manufacturability advice to the designer. Use of the proposed system is demonstrated for the manufacturability assessment of typical die-cast parts.

Keywords:

• Design for manufacturability (DFM)
• Geometric reasoning
• Die-casting
• Process knowledge
• Feature recognition