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The new DFA software offers engineers tools for evaluating design concepts and creating innovative products with fewer parts. It allows product engineers to quantify assembly time and labor costs, assists to identify unnecessary parts in an assembly , assess the cost contribution of each part in the assembly which helps to simplify the product through part reduction strategies therein reduce part costs as well as assembly costs
Design for Assembly (DFA) software tools help you simplify products by focusing the attention of design teams on part count and part count reduction. Product simplification is achieved through the application of our industry-tested minimum part count criteria. The analysis allows you to determine the theoretical minimum number of parts that must be in the design for the product to function as required. When you identify and eliminate unnecessary parts, you eliminate unnecessary manufacturing and assembly costs.
Suppliers are a rich source of feedback during product simplification, particularly if one of your options is to consolidate multiple parts into one part with multiple features. As a design matures, DFA tools help avoid part proliferation and ensure that costs do not creep back into the product.
Benefits of using Design for Assembly software
DFA complements Design for Manufacture (DFM). Engineers use DFA software to reduce the assembly cost of a product by consolidating parts into elegant and multifunctional designs. DFM software then allows the design engineer quickly to judge the cost of producing the new design and to compare it with the cost of producing the original assembly. Used together, DFM and DFA software gives engineers an early cost profile of product designs, providing a basis for planning and decision making. Such analyses, when performed at the earliest stages of concept design, have the potential to greatly influence manufacturing and other life-cycle costs before the costs are locked in
Product engineers know that 65% to 85% percent of manufacturing costs are determined in the early stages of design. When you make informed design decisions during the concept stage, you avoid costly corrections later on. Use DFA software to
Estimate assembly difficulties
You can establish a rating for your product design in terms of its difficulty of assembly. The software rates each part according to how it is grasped, oriented and moved for insertion and to how it is inserted and/or fastened onto the product.
Decision Support.
The software provides quantifiable information so your team can evaluate and examine all potential design solutions and select the most effective approach. You can easily incorporate design inputs from other groups, such as users, service and marketing.
Benchmarking products.
The DFA index, a measure of assembly efficiency, serves as a basis for quantitatively comparing design alternatives internally or against competitor products. The software yields an objective measure that is independent of product size or complexity.
Design reviews
DFA analysis can guide the progress of a design, verifying improvement as it evolves. As you eliminate redundant parts or operations and remove assembly difficulties, assembly efficiency scores noticeably improve.
Improve designer skills.
The software helps designers aim for part count reduction in the design. In the process, engineers identify design concepts that reduce unnecessary complexity and cost.
Integrate design and manufacturing.
The DFA approach gives you an overall structure for making design changes in light of related material and manufacturing costs. Used together, DFA and DFM enable engineers to select appropriate and cost-effective shape-forming processes for components.
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