Precision Assembly Simulation of Skin Model Shapes Accounting for Contact Deformation and Geometric Deviations for Statistical Tolerance Analysis Method

Tolerance analysis methods, which are important to achieve a balance between manufacturing costs and functional requirements, have been studied and improved over the last 30 years. This paper proposes a new method to improve the precision of assembly simulation for statistical assembly simulation; by investigating the effect of the geometric deviations and mechanical behaviors of assembly contact on the stack-up assembly deviation by combining the recent theories on the tolerance analysis of rigid bodies and local contact deformation. To improve the precision of the tolerance analysis, real parts with form defects were simulated with the help of non-nominal skin model shapes. The SMSs were first considered to be rigid, and a quadratic optimization-based method for the rigid body displacement was used to calculate the initial contact points of all the SMSs. Next, contact deformation, following Hertzian contact theory, occurred at the initial contact points, which changed the relative positions of the SMSs in the subsequent interactions. The iteration process was convergent, and the final simulation for tolerance analysis could be generated after several iterations. Case studies demonstrated the practicality of the proposed method. Their actual assembly deviations were simulated by combining the effects of geometric deviations and local surface deformations. Since the proposed tolerance analysis framework based on statistical assembly simulation, it is expected to control the functional requirements of mechanical assemblies with much rough tolerance design and help optimize the tolerance in the future.