Flexible Automation and Integrated Manufacturing 1999

ISBN Print: 978-1-56700-133-4

Design for Manufacturing across the Supply Chain in the Printed Circuit Board Industry

DOI: 10.1615/FAIM1999.880
pages 1033-1043

Abstrakt

This paper discusses the research development of a design for manufacturing (DFM) system that can be used between companies within the supply chain. The impetus for such a system is driven by the US electronics industry trend in which original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) purchase 85% of their printed circuit board (PCB) needs from qualified suppliers. Consequently, there is a growing separation between design knowledge and manufacturing knowledge. The problem is exacerbated since manufacturing capabilities can vary significantly between suppliers, PCB technology advances rapidly, and design/manufacturing process inconsistencies can greatly delay the development of new electronics products. This problem is being addressed with a DFM system that utilizes an object-oriented information model of supplier's manufacturing capabilities, data derived from statistical process control systems, a yield model, a cost model, and a fuzzy query interface. The statistical process control data provides a unique representation of each individual supplier's manufacturing capabilities. The manufacturing model is in EXPRESS. The contribution of the system is that the designer can compare the cost and quality of different design alternatives for a single supplier or between different suppliers using actual manufacturing data. The preliminary implementation architecture is being developed for the Internet such that the supplier's manufacturing capability model resides locally and the designer transmits queries via the Internet.