Читать книгу Computer Aided Design and Manufacturing - Zhuming Bi - Страница 32

Undergraduates in mechanical engineering with a minor in manufacturing engineering must understand theoretical fundamentals related to the design of products and manufacturing processes. On the other hand, the theories and methods relevant to high‐level planning, scheduling, or computer implementation might not be the first priority for them. To meet our specified teaching needs, the engineering curriculum in Figure 1.23 can be utilized to choose appropriate contents for our students. The selected course elements are highlighted in Figure 1.23. The covered CAD/CAM theory and methods are illustrated in Figure 1.24 and the corresponding computer aided technologies and tools are accordingly specified in Figure 1.25. The customized CAD/CAM course consists both of the theoretical part in Figure 1.24 and the practical training part in Figure 1.25. To sustain the independence for the selection of course elements in a modularized course framework, the axiomatic design theory has been applied to map the theoretical part in Figure 1.24 to the computer‐aided tools in Figure 1.25 (Bi and Mueller 2016).

Figure 1.23 Selective subjects in a new CAD/CAM course.

Figure 1.24 Selective concepts in the CAD/CAM theory.

Figure 1.25 Selective CAD/CAM tools.

As an introduction to the CAD/CAM course, human designers and computers are compared to clarify the roles of computers for design activities at different design phases of products and systems. The computer applications in engineering are overviewed. The course structure is presented and the main design concepts related to products and manufacturing processes are discussed. Figure 1.26 illustrates the organization of the customized CAD/CAM book. Each of the selected concepts corresponds to a section/chapter in the course. Besides the introduction section, all of the other sections include the laboratories where one functional module of the CAD/CAM software tool is utilized to illustrate the application of computer aided technology to formulate and solve real‐world engineering design problems. The unique features of this course framework include (i) coverage of a broad scope of sub‐disciplines so that the students can understand better the design challenges over the product lifecycles in a minimal class setting, (ii) selection of course elements that is oriented where individual functional modules are available in commercial computer aided software tools to handle the formulated design problems in corresponding disciplines, and (iii) emphasis on the self‐guiding exploration of a comprehensive CAD/CAM software tool, so that students in mechanical or manufacturing engineering are able to formulate multidisciplinary problems and use the correct computer aided tools to solve problems effectively.

Figure 1.26 Customized outline of the CAD/CAM book.