Automated design of fixtures for FMS

Abstract

A system for the automated design of fixtures is under development at the University of Minnesota at Duluth and at the University of Birmingham, UK. This system is being developed on a microVAX and a GPX workstation using solid modeling CAD (computer-aided design) and a Lisp-based inference engine. The CAD-rulebase interface languages being used are Fortran and C. A structured set of rules has been assembled and is discussed. The application of the design tool and a simple knowledge base to jigs and fixtures is presented.<>