Engineering Design

Phases in the Design Process

• Phase I: Conceptual design
• Recognition of a need
• Definition of the problem
• Gathering of information
• Developing a design concept
• Choosing between competing concepts (evaluation)
• Phase II: Embodiment design
• Product architecture-arrangement of the physical
functions
• Configuration design-preliminary selection of materials,
modeling and sizing of parts
• Parametric design-creating a robust design, and
selection of final dimensions and tolerances
• Phase III: Detail design
• Creation of final drawings and specifications
Phases in the Design Process
 Conceptual design
• Conceptual design is the process by which the design is initiated,
carried to the point of creating a number of possible solutions,
and narrowed down to a single best concept.
• It is sometimes called the feasibility study.
• Conceptual design is the phase that requires the greatest
creativity, involves the most uncertainty, and requires
coordination among many functions in the business organization
 Conceptual design
• Input:
1. Revised problem statement
2. Requirements (ranked)
3. Statement of Deliverables ƒ
• Tasks:
1. Establish desired design functions
2. Generate conceptual design alternatives
3. Compare conceptual design alternatives
• Output:
1. Most promising conceptual design(s)
 Activities Under Conceptual Design
• Identification of customer needs: The goal of this activity is to
completely understand the customers’ needs and to communicate
them to the design team.
• Problem definition: The goal of this activity is to create a
statement that describes what has to be accomplished to satisfy
the needs of the customer. This involves analysis of competitive
products, the establishment of target specifications, and the
listing of constraints and trade-offs.
• Gathering information: Engineering design presents special
requirements over engineering research in the need to acquire a
broad spectrum of information.
• Conceptualization: Concept generation involves creating a
broad set of concepts that potentially satisfy the problem
statement. Team-based creativity methods, combined with
efficient information gathering, are the key activities
 Activities Under Conceptual Design
• Concept selection: Evaluation of the design concepts, modifying
and evolving into a single preferred concept, are the activities in
this step. The process usually requires several iterations.
• Design review: Before committing funds to move to the next
design phase, a design review will be held. The design review
will assure that the design is physically realizable and that it is
economically worthwhile. It will also look at a detailed product
development schedule. This is needed to devise a strategy to
minimize product cycle time and to identify the resources in
people, equipment, and money needed to complete the project.
 Embodiment Design
Embodiment phase of design is divided into three activities
• Product architecture: determining the arrangement of the
physical elements of the design into groupings, called modules.
• Configuration design: the design of special-purpose parts and
the selection of standard components, like pumps or motors.
• Parametric design: determining the exact values, dimensions,
or tolerances of the components or component features that are
deemed critical-to-quality Conceptual Design Preliminary
(Embodiment) Design Detail Design
 Embodiment Design
• It is the process in which a structured development of the
preferred concept is carried out
• It is the place where flesh is placed on the skeleton of the design
concept.
• An embodiment of all the main functions that must be performed
by the product must be undertaken.
• It is in this design phase that decisions are made on strength,
material selection, size, shape, and spatial compatibility.
• Beyond this design phase, major changes become very
expensive.
• This design phase is sometimes called preliminary design.
 Common Questions to Ask

• Will it Work?
• Is it safe?
• What function does it serve?
• Will it be made from scratch, bought in, or made from a semi-
finished material?
• How does it fit in with the rest of the design?
• What development will be required?
• How long will it last?
• How might it fail in practice?
 Embodiment Design
• Embodiment design is concerned with three major tasks
1) Product architecture
2) Configuration design
3) Parametric design.
Product architecture :
• Product architecture is concerned with dividing the overall
design system into subsystems or modules.
• In this step we decide how the physical components of the design
are to be arranged and combined to carry out the functional
duties of the design.
 Embodiment Design
Configuration design of parts and components :
• Parts are made up of features like holes, ribs, splines, and
curves. Configuring a part means to determine what features will
be present and how those features are to be arranged in space
relative to each other.
• modeling and simulation may be performed in this stage to
check out function and spatial constraints, only approximate
sizes are determined to assure that the part satisfies the PDS.
• Specification about materials and manufacturing is given here.
The generation of a physical model of the part with rapid
prototyping processes may be appropriate.
 Embodiment Design
Parametric design of parts :
• Parametric design starts with information on the configuration of
the part and aims to establish its exact dimensions and
tolerances.
• Final decisions on the material and manufacturing processes are
also established if this has not been done previously.
• An important aspect of parametric design is to examine the part,
assembly, and system for design robustness.
• Robustness refers to how consistently a component performs
under variable conditions in its service environment.
• Parametric design also deals with determining the aspects of the
design that could lead to failure.
• Another important consideration in parametric design is to
design in such a way that manufacturability is enhanced.
 Detailed Design
• In this phase the design is brought to the stage of a complete
engineering description of a tested and producible product.
Missing information is added on the arrangement, form,
dimensions, tolerances, surface properties, materials, and
manufacturing processes of each part.
• This results in a specification for each special-purpose part and
for each standard part to be purchased from suppliers.
Activities and Documentation in Detailed Design Process
• Detailed engineering drawings suitable for manufacturing. Routinely these
are computer-generated drawings, and they often include three-dimensional
CAD models.
• Verification testing of prototypes is successfully completed and verification
data is submitted. All critical-to-quality parameters are confirmed to be under
control. Usually the building and testing of several preproduction versions of
the product will be accomplished.
• Assembly drawings and assembly instructions also will be completed. The
bill of materials for all assemblies will be completed.
• A detailed product specification, updated with all the changes made since the
conceptual design phase, will be prepared.
• Decisions on whether to make each part internally or to buy from an external
supplier will be made.
• With the preceding information, a detailed cost estimate for the product will
be carried out.
• Finally, detail design concludes with a design review before the decision is
made to pass the design information on to manufacturing.
 What are aesthetics?
• Aesthetics is the philosophical study of beauty and taste.
• In design, aesthetics refers to the visual attractiveness of a
product.
• Studies have proven that creating good aesthetics in a product
leads to better usability and user experience.
• Aesthetics can involve your emotions, as well as all your senses
(sight, touch, taste, smell, and hearing)
• An aesthetic response is immediate and involuntary.
• It establishes an early opinion regarding preference.
• Aesthetics are a big part of what creates a satisfying user
experience
 What are aesthetics?
• In the field of user experience design and interaction design,
aesthetics is important because it impacts the user experience of
a product in several ways.
• Firstly, it creates an attractiveness bias. When users visit a
website, or try a new app, they make quick decisions on whether
or not to continue using it. Much of that decision hinges on the
aesthetic appeal of the design.
• Secondly, good aesthetics helps to make users more tolerant of
usability issues. Studies have found that visually appealing
websites are rated as more usable than they actually are, because
their attractiveness elicits pleasant emotions in users.
 Design Vs. Aesthetics
• Design encompasses much more. It takes into account all aspects
of how a product engages with a user, including ergonomics,
operation, features, assembly, and of course, form and function.
Design essentially defines how the product works.
• Aesthetics is about how the product is perceived.
• To be considered great design and desirable to users, a product
must both function well and exhibit good design with attributes
like beauty, smart ergonomics, and a form that aids in function.
 Design for production
• Design for production (DFP) refers to methods that evaluate
manufacturing system performance as a function of product
design variables.
• DFP can advise a product development team to consider
changing the product design to avoid problems or improve
profitability.
• In addition, DFP can provoke suggestions to improve the
existing manufacturing system.
• In general, Design for manufacturability (DFM) and Design for
assembly (DFA) evaluate the materials, the required
manufacturing processes, and the ease of assembly.
• That is, DFM and DFA study the feasibility and cost of
manufacturing the product at the operation level.
• On the other hand, DFP evaluates manufacturing system
performance at the production line, factory, or supply chain
level.
• Like DFM and DFA, DFP can lead a product development team to
consider changing the product design to avoid problems or
improve profitability
 Design for Standardization
• Ever-increasing demand for new products from customers is
forcing OEMs to launch innovative products at record speeds.
• Launching a new product could mean either starting from scratch
and designing something revolutionary or putting existing pieces
together and creating something evolutionary.
• The success of design for standardization approach depends
heavily on how successful designers are at implementing and
using the current available set of parts and reusing them for
creating new products by minimizing total number of parts used.
• This is important for new products to be launched in the market
on time, reduction in redesigning cost, eliminating redundant
components both at supplier and OEM levels and optimization of
overall product life-cycle by bringing in standardization.
• Almost every major OEM (irrespective of the sector) is focusing
on part standardization to reduce lead times, improve part quality
and reduce costs.
• Standardization helps in sharing more standard parts, standard
platforms for different categories of products and enhanced
modularity in manufacturing processes.
• Apart from operational gains, standardization initiatives enhance
global sourcing of components and supplier modularization.
 Benefits of standardization
• Standard components, assemblies
• Common platforms
• Shop floor integration for efficient manufacturing
• Standard machine tools for cost effective manufacturing
• Standard design rules for better quality designs
• Definitive operating parameters
 Design for Minimum Risk (DFMR)
• Design for Minimum Risk (DFMR) is a term used by NASA
programs as an expansion of the general hazard reduction process
where if an identified hazard cannot be eliminated, the design is
modified to reduce the associated mishap risk to an acceptable
level.
• DFMR is a set of specific requirements to minimize risk.
• DFMR relies on robust design, standard approach, and high
quality to provide the increased likelihood the required function is
available.
• These aspects require a well-understood desired function together
with a fully developed quality system to be effective
 Design for Ease of maintenance
• Maintainability is created during the design process. It cannot be
added later.
• Establish the maintenance philosophy in terms of ‘repair versus
disposal’ of the product or components. Do this before starting any
design work.
• Consider where maintenance will take place (1st. 2nd or 3rd line).
• Consult the maintenance engineer during the design phase and
agree upon a set of documents to be handed over to the
maintenance people.
• Keep it simple. Complex arrangements are usually harder to
maintain.
• Make it testable. Reactive (fault finding) tests often reveal latent
problems that will become faults in the near future. Include
diagnostic test points in electrical circuits. Include mechanisms
that provide early warning of impending failure.
 Design for Ease of maintenance
• Design reliability into items that are difficult to maintain (such as
components deep within an engine), to reduce the need for
maintenance access.
• Reduce maintenance frequency overall by ruggedizing and over-
specifying components to withstand occasional overload.
• Provide warning labels where a maintenance engineer may be
exposed to danger. For example on hot or heavy items or where
there is stored mechanical or electrical energy.
• Provide maintenance instructions and information panels if the
routine is difficult to remember, and fix them as close to the point
of maintenance as possible.
• Design equipment to fail-safe so that risk of injury to
maintenance engineers is reduced.
• Avoid the requirement for special tools.
 Design for Quality
• Understand past quality problems
• Raise and resolve issues early
• Use Multi-functional teamwork
• Utilize Quality function deployment (QFD)
• Do thorough up-front work
• Simplify the design
• Minimize the exponential cumulative effect of part quality and
quantity
• Select the highest quality processing
• Proactively minimizing all types of risk
• Reusing proven designs
• Document thoroughly and completely
• Thoroughly design the product right the first time
 Service Design
• Service design is a process in which the designer focuses on
creating optimal service experiences.
• This requires taking a holistic view of all the related actors, their
interactions, and supporting materials and infrastructures.
• Service design often involves the use of customer journey maps,
which tell the story of different customers’ interactions with a
brand, thus offering deep insights.
Five basic principles that underlie service design
User-centered, through understanding the user by doing qualitative
research
Co-creative, by involving all relevant stakeholders in the design process
Sequencing, by partitioning a complex service into separate processes
Evidencing, by visualizing service experiences and making them
tangible
Holistic, by considering touchpoints in a network of interactions and
users
Module 4
 What is Usability?
• Usability is part of the broader term “user experience” and refers
to the ease of access and/or use of a product or website.
• A design is not usable or unusable by its features, together with
the context of the user (what the user wants to do with it and the
user’s environment), determine its level of usability
• The official ISO 9241-11 definition of usability is: “the extent
to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve
specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction
in a specified context of use.”
 Usability
A usable interface has three main outcomes:
• It should be easy for the user to become familiar with and
competent in using the user interface during the first contact
with the website. For example, if a travel agent’s website is a
well-designed one, the user should be able to move through the
sequence of actions to book a ticket quickly.
• It should be easy for users to achieve their objective through
using the website. If a user has the goal of booking a flight, a
good design will guide him/her through the easiest process to
purchase that ticket.
• It should be easy to recall the user interface and how to use it
on subsequent visits. So, a good design on the travel agent’s
site means the user should learn from the first time and book a
second ticket just as easily.
 What is Usability Testing?
• Usability Testing is defined as a type of software testing where, a
small set of target end-users, of a software system, "use" it to
expose usability defects.
• This testing mainly focuses on the user's ease to use the
application, flexibility in handling controls and the ability of the
system to meet its objectives.
• It is also called User Experience (UX) Testing.
• This testing is recommended during the initial design phase of
SDLC, which gives more visibility on the expectations of the
users
 How to do Usability Testing: Complete Process

Planning
• During this phase the goals of usability test are determined.
• Determination critical functionalities and objectives of the
system.
• Testers are assigned to evaluate these critical functionalities.
• During this phase, the usability testing method, number &
demographics of usability testers, test report formats are also
determined
Recruiting
• During this phase, recruitment of the desired number of testers as
per your usability test plan is carried out.
• Finding testers who match your demographic (age, sex etc.) and
professional ( education, job etc.) profile can take time.
Usability Testing
• During this phase, usability tests are actually executed.
Data Analysis
• Data from usability tests is thoroughly analysed to derive
meaningful inferences and give actionable recommendations to
improve the overall usability of your product.
Reporting
• Findings of the usability test is shared with all concerned
stakeholders which can include designer, developer, client, and
CEO
 Methods of Usability Testing
• There are two methods available to do usability testing
Laboratory Usability Testing
Remote Usability Testing

Laboratory Usability Testing

• This testing is conducted in a separate lab room in presence of
the observers.
• The testers are assigned tasks to execute.
• The role of the observer is to monitor the behaviour of the testers
and report the outcome of testing.
• The observer remains silent during the course of testing.
• In this testing, both observers and testers are present in a same
physical location.
 Methods of Usability Testing
Remote Usability Testing
• Under this testing observers and testers are remotely located.
• Testers access the system under test, remotely and perform
assigned tasks.
• Tester's voice , screen activity , testers facial expressions are
recorded by an automated software.
• Observers analyze this data and report findings of the test.
 How many users do you need ?
• Research indicates that 5 users are enough to uncover 80% of
usability problems. Some researchers suggest other
numbers.
• The actual number of the user required depends on the
complexity of the given application and your usability goals.
• Increase in usability participants results into increased cost,
planning , participant management and data analysis.
• But as a general guideline, if you on a small budget 5 is a good
number to start with.
• If budget is not a constraint its best consult experienced
professionals to determine the number of users.
 Usability Testing
Advantages of Usability Testing
• It helps uncover usability issues before the product is marketed.
• It helps improve end-user satisfaction
• It makes your system highly effective and efficient
• It helps gather true feedback from your target audience who
actually use your system during a usability test.
• You do not need to rely on "opinions" from random people.

Disadvantages of Usability Testing

• Cost is a major consideration in usability testing. It takes lots of
resources to set up a Usability Test Lab. Recruiting and
management of usability testers can also be expensive
 What is customer co-creation?
• Co-creation strategy that aims to bring together different groups
of people, typically bringing in a third party, to assist with
product development or creative processes.
• In essence, customer co-creation requires contribution from
external parties, be it customers, stakeholders, online crowd
forums etc.
• Customer co-creation often utilises the opinions and ideas from
a customer base, bringing fresh and innovative concepts to a
business.
 Benefits of customer co-creation
• Deep insights about people’s true needs and wants — from
the source: Co-creation sessions uncover insights that won’t
come from surveys, focus groups, or even in-depth interviews.
• An efficient way to get to solutions that really work. Too often,
firms gamble that their multiyear multimillion-dollar development
projects will meet customers’ needs. Co-creation mitigates that
risk fast because it can identify which elements of a product,
service or experience provide value and generate ideas for how to
fix the ones that don’t — all within the confines of a single
workshop.
• A catalyst for organizational change. As Virgin Media’s head of
customer experience design Paul Morris explains, “People pay
more attention to the output when you’ve taken them on the
design journey and they feel involved. The solution holds more
water than if I make up the design myself.”
 What are human factors?
• According to a definition shared by the World Health
Organization, human factors “refer to environmental,
organizational and job factors, and human and individual
characteristics which influence behaviour at work in a way
which can affect health and safety.”
• These factors can be further isolated to include several specific
elements as follows:
Tasks, workload and work patterns.
Working environment and workplace design.
Workplace culture and communication.
Leadership and resources.
Policies, programs and procedures.
Worker competency and skill.
Employee attitude, personality and risk tolerance.
 How do human factors impact safety?

• The thing to remember when looking at human factors is the fact

that everyone in the workplace is indeed “only human.” Thus, they
are fallible.
• Accidents can normally be attributed to one of three actions:
Errors and unintentional mistakes.
Poor judgment and bad decision making.
Disregard for procedures.
• Most workplaces are adept at identifying obvious hazards and
providing basic safety training upon hiring new employees.
• However, the evaluation of human factors should be an ongoing
effort that involves all employees.
• Only by understanding human factors, can an occupational safety
professional seek out ways to mitigate risk with stopgap measures
that prevent accidents before they occur.
 Can risks from human factors be eliminated?
• No dangers can be fully eliminated from a workplace.
• However, proper education can go a long way in mitigating risk.
• Initial safety training is a standard practice for most organizations.
Unfortunately, safety manuals and curriculum can be quickly
outdated.
• New OHSA regulations emerge on a periodic basis and should be
shared as must-know information for employees at different
levels.
• Requiring regular safety update meetings or webinars will ensure
that everyone receives the same message. Putting up a poster is
not enough.
 Risk analysis
• Risk analysis is the process of identifying and analyzing
potential issues that could negatively impact key business
initiatives or critical projects in order to help organizations avoid
or mitigate those risks.
• Performing a risk analysis includes considering the probability
of adverse events caused by either natural processes, like severe
storms, earthquakes or floods, or adverse events caused by
malicious or inadvertent human activities.
• An important part of risk analysis is identifying the potential for
harm from these events, as well as the likelihood that they will
occur.
 Why to perform risk analysis?
 anticipate and reduce the effect of harmful results from adverse
events
 evaluate whether the potential risks of a project are balanced by
its benefits to aid in the decision process when evaluating
whether to move forward with the project
 plan responses for technology or equipment failure or loss from
adverse events, both natural and human-caused
 identify the impact of and prepare for changes in the enterprise
environment, including the likelihood of new competitors
entering the market or changes to government regulatory policy.
 Steps in risk analysis process
1) Conduct a risk assessment survey
This first step, getting input from management and department
heads, is critical to the risk assessment process. The risk assessment
survey is a way to begin documenting specific risks or threats within
each department.
2) Identify the risks
The reason for performing risk assessment is to evaluate an IT
system or other aspect of the organization and then ask:
What are the risks to the software, hardware, data
and IT employees?
What are the possible adverse events that could
occur, such as human error, fire, flooding or
earthquakes?
What is the potential that the integrity of the system
will be compromised or that it won't be available?
 Steps in risk analysis process
3) Analyze the risks
Once the risks are identified, the risk analysis process should
determine the likelihood that each risk will occur, as well as the
consequences linked to each risk and how they might affect the
objectives of a project.
4) Develop a risk management plan
Based on an analysis of which assets are valuable and which threats
will probably affect those assets negatively, the risk analysis should
produce control recommendations that can be used to mitigate,
transfer, accept or avoid the risk.
5) Implement the risk management plan:
The ultimate goal of risk assessment is to implement measures to
remove or reduce the risks. Starting with the highest-priority risk,
resolve or at least mitigate each risk so it's no longer a threat.
 Steps in risk analysis process
Monitor the risks
The ongoing process of identifying, treating and managing risks
should be an important part of any risk analysis process
 System Reliability
• Reliability of a product is defined as the probability that the
product will not fail throughout a prescribed operating period.
• Most products are made up of a number of components.
• The reliability of each component and the configuration of the
system consisting of these components determines the system
reliability (i.e., the reliability of the product).
 System Forms
The components may be in –
1) Series: system performs satisfactorily if all components
are fully functional
For example: series of lighting bulbs
2) Parallel: system performs if any one component
remains operational
For example,
(i) an airplane with four engines,
(ii) a laptop with a power source and a battery.
3) combination of series and parallel
 Series system
Calculation of reliability

• System fails if any one of its components fails

2 …
1 n

Independent components

RS = R1  …  Rn
 Parallel system:
calculation of reliability

• System survives if one component survives

n
3

n
Rs  1   (1  Ri )
i 1
 Generic approach for reliability analysis of
complex systems
• List all possible modes
• Break down the event “system failure” into disjoint events
• Calculate the failure probabilities of these events
• System failure probability equals the sum of probabilities
of the above events.
 Modeling and Simulation
• Modeling and simulation is the use of models (e.g., physical,
mathematical, or logical representation of a system, entity,
phenomenon, or process) as a basis for simulations to develop
data utilized for managerial or technical decision making
• A computer is used to build a mathematical model which
contains key parameters of the physical model.
• The mathematical model represents the physical model in virtual
form, and conditions are applied that set up the experiment of
interest.
• The simulation starts – i.e, the computer calculates the results of
those conditions on the mathematical model – and outputs
results in a format that is either machine- or human-readable,
depending upon the implementation
 Modeling and Simulation
• M&S helps to reduce costs, increase the quality of products and
systems, and document and archive lessons learned.
• Because the results of a simulation are only as good as the
underlying model(s), engineers, operators, and analysts must pay
particular attention to its construction.
• To ensure that the results of the simulation are applicable to the
real world, the user must understand the assumptions,
conceptualizations, and constraints of its implementation.
• Additionally, models may be updated and improved using results
of actual experiments.
• The use of such mathematical models and simulations avoids
actual experimentation, which can be costly and time-consuming.
• Instead, mathematical knowledge and computational power is
used to solve real-world problems cheaply and in a time efficient
manner.