Method to Decrease Complexity in Engineering Design and Technical Systems

In the early phase of product design and development cycle, the customer needs are transformed in terms of functional requirements. At the conceptual design stage, the designers conceive a design concept by developing design parameters to satisfy the given functional requirements. The relationships between the set of functional requirements and the set of design parameters are represented in a design matrix. However, the design concept often has off-diagonal element(s) in the design matrix. These elements consequently create coupling terms that increase the complexity of the design concept. In the Axiomatic Design framework, eliminating an off-diagonal element from a design matrix will increase the flexibility design interaction structure, therefore reducing the design complexity. This paper presents a method to reduce the complexity in engineering design and technical systems. It helps support the designer identifying which coupling term(s) should be eliminated to decouple a coupled design, also to decrease the complexity of a decoupled design.