Adaptable design

Increasing competition for better product functionality, quality, features, customization, environmental friendliness, lower cost and shorter delivery time presents unprecedented challenges for product manufacturing enterprises. These challenges cannot be completely addressed by advanced manufacturing technologies alone as some of which are originated from product design. Advanced design technologies and tools for early product design processes are critically needed where most important decisions are made with respect to the product functionality, quality, manufacturability, cost and environmental performance. This paper discusses adaptable design (AD) as a design paradigm for both business success and environmental protection. Adaptable design aims at developing products that are adaptable in their design and/or their production. Adaptability is defined as the extension of the utility (service) of products. Two types of adaptabilities are proposed as product adaptability and design adaptability. Two types of design adaptations are also identified, which include foreseeable specific adaptations and unforeseeable general adaptations. The former can be described by specific adaptability and the latter by general adaptability. Three key elements of AD are presented including functions independence, a measure of adaptability and a function based design process model of the AD. Based on these concepts and design objectives, adaptable design methods and general design guidelines are proposed. Examples are included to illustrate the concepts, design methods and guidelines.