An expert system for analysing the printability and integratability of assembly structures under the context of design for additive manufacturing

Abstract

Additive manufacturing (AM) has the capability of producing parts with more complicated shapes and functions compared with subtractive manufacturing. Design for additive manufacturing (DfAM) aims at producing design solutions that can be additively manufactured. During DfAM, analysing the printability and integratbility of a target assembly are important tasks. However, the tasks require systematic analysis of the structural/functional/material characteristics, working conditions, and interaction relations among the parts in the target assembly, fully understanding of the capability and limitation of the applied AM equipment, and comprehensive design decision-making considering the characteristics of AM processing, etc. This makes it challenging to conduct printability and integratbility analysis tasks. In this regard, an expert system is established which is realised with Function-Behaviour-Structure oriented assembly structure characteristic analysing, ontology instance-based assembly structure characteristic modelling, and modified RETE algorithm-based design decision-making. The system is capable of providing decision guidance on which parts in a target assembly can be printed and which among these printable parts can be printed integratedly. In this way, it can support DfAM implementation in a computer-aided manner. A WebApp that encapsulates the system is developed, and a robot arm DfAM redesign project is used as a case study.