DEFINITION OF DESIGN

Design is the process of mapping functional requirements to design Parameters

THE DESIGN PROCESS 1. Establishment of need or realize there is a problem to be solved. 2. Understanding of the problem. 3. Generation of potential solutions for it. 4. Evaluation of the solutions by comparing the potential solutions and deciding on the best one. 5. Documentation of the work.

Detailed model of the design process

Identifying customer needs

The process of identifying customer needs:

1. Gather raw data from customers. 2. Interpret the raw data in terms of customers needs. 3. Organize the needs into a hierarchy of primary and secondary needs. 4. Establish the relative importance of the needs. 5. Reflect on the results and the process.

The goals of a method for comprehensively identifying a set of customer needs should be: 1. Ensure that the product is focused on customer needs. 2. Identify latent or hidden needs as well as explicit needs. 3. Provide a fact base for justifying the product specification. 4. Create an archival record of the needs activity of the development process. 5. Ensure that no critical customer need is missed or forgotten. 6. Develop a common understanding of customer needs among members of the development team.

Establishing the design requirements

A specification consists of a metric and a value.

Concept generation
The design problem is taken and broad solutions are generated in the form of schemes. The concept generation stage can be divided into 4 steps: 1. Clarification of the problem. 2. Gathering of information. 3. Use and adaptation of design team' s knowledge. 4. Organization of team's thinking.

Concept selection
The purpose of concept selection is assessing the feasibility of concepts to ensure that they are achievable technically and economically. It is known that decisions made during the design process have the greatest effect on the cost of a product for the least investment.

DESIGN PROCESS PARADOX

The design process paradox states that during the design process, the knowledge about the design increases as the project runs in time and the design team gains understanding of the problem at hand. Hence, the knowledge of the design team is at its top when the design process is at its end.

Concept testing
1. Definition of the purpose of the concept test. 2. Choosing of a survey population. 3. Choosing of a survey format. 4. Communication of the concept. 5. Measurement of customer response. 6. Interpretation of results.

Preliminary design
The preliminary design helps to obtain more precise design requirements involving analysis, benchmarking, literature search, experience, good judgment and, if necessary, testing.

Detailed design
Detail design is mostly concerned with the design of the subsystems and components that make up the entire design.

Customer satisfaction
The lower curve in Kano's diagram is called the basic performance curve or expected requirements curve The upper curve in Kano's diagram is called the delighted performance curve or exciting requirements curve. The center line of the Kano diagram is called the one-to-one quality or linear quality line.

Example: Consider 4 cars of your choice. Furthermore, consider the following function: Secondary restrain system protection. Draw a kano diagram for both functions. Be sure to write down what 4 cars you considered.

Types of customer needs

Direct needs Latent needs Constant needs Variable needs General needs

Gather data from customers

Obtain information from customers, several methods are available: interviews, questionnaires, focus groups, observing the product in use and finally, be the customer oneself.

Interviews are generally carried out in the environment of the costumer where the
product is used.

Focus groups are typically conducted in a special room equipped with a two-way
mirror allowing several members of the development team to observe the group.

Customer selection matrix

Interpret raw data

Express the need in terms of what the product has to do, not in terms of how it might do it.

Determination of relative importance of needs

SIX SIGMA
The a Six Sigma project, five stages are used to improve a process (DMAIC): Define the problem and customer requirements! Measure the defects and process operation! Analyze the data and discover causes of the problem! Improve the process to remove causes of defects! Control the process to make sure defects don t appear again.

. DESIGN FOR SIX SIGMA

Is a systematic methodology using tools, training, and measurements to enable the design of products, services and processes that meet customer expectations at Six Sigma quality levels.

Identify Requirements Define the Design Optimize the Design Validate the Design

Benchmarking- creates an awareness of what products are already available, and second, reveal opportunities to improve what already exists.

Benchmarking activities are vital at all stages of the product development as

they: provide a way to understand what needs other products are satisfying provide means to establish product specifications ensuring that products goals superpass existing competition help in the concept generation stage providing best-in-class concepts help to incorporate in the detailed design new and improved design features of the best-in-class products help to find the best-in-class components and suppliers

QFD
Quality Function Deployment of QFD, helps to translate customer requirements (Voice of the Customer) into technical requirements.

The QFD technique uses six steps to do this translation: 1. Identifying the customer(s). 2. Determining customer requirements. 3. Determining relative importance of the requirements. 4. Competition benchmarking. 5. Translating customer requirements into measurable engineering requirements. 6. Setting engineering targets for the design.

QFD BENEFITS Helps to keep focus on what is important to the customer. Helps to document and keep track of the customer needs. Provides a mean to evaluate how well competitors fulfill customer needs. Helps to detect possible problems that may arise during the design of the product.

STEPS OT BUILD THE HOUSE OF QUALITY 1. Determine customer needs. 2. Establish how competition satisfies the customers. 3. Generate engineering specifications and engineering targets. 4. Relate customer needs to engineering specifications. 5. Identify relationships between engineering requirements.

TRANSLATING CUSTOMER NEEDS 1. Express the need in terms of what the product has to do, not in terms of how it might do it. 2. Express the need as specifically as the raw data. 3. Use positive, not negative, phrasing. 4. Express the need as an attribute of the product. 5. Avoid the words must and should. BENCHMARKING STEPS 1. Form a list of customer requirements. 2. Form a list of competitive or related products. 3. Conduct an information search. 4. Tear down multiple products in class. 5. Benchmark by customer requirement. 6. Establish best-in-class competitors by customer requirement.