A Manufacturing Agent to Retrieve Machining Knowledge in Model-based Manufacturing

Model-Based Definition (MBD) gathers and manages all the product and process data using computer models. It is believed that applying MBD in product development can bring benefits such as: reduction in cost, increase in quality, and decrease in schedule. However, the application of MBD to downstream manufacturing and inspection processes still has not been fully realized, and more effort is needed to fully implement a model-based manufacturing system. In this paper, a Manufacturing Agent module is proposed and developed to retrieve machining knowledge for process engineers, which connects design phase to manufacturing phase in a pure 3D environment. The design intent and manufacturing information is defined in the MBD and is interpreted and analyzed to extract the manufacturing knowledge for the machining process. In this solution, the master 3D MBD is used in both design and manufacturing, and thus time and cost promises to be saved by eliminating engineering drawings and redundant models. The system framework and the core functional modules are presented, and a prototype system is implemented to demonstrate the feasibility of the system and its effectiveness.