SPIRAL DESIGN-MODEL FOR CONSUMER MECHATRONIC PRODUCTS

A spiral design model for consumer mechatronic products (CMPs) is desc ribed. The development of CMPs often requires frequent design changes, and some CMP production tools are expensive and have long fabrication leadtime. The spiral model can reduce the tooling commitment and allo w more design flexibility at early stages of the design process. It di vides the design process into five phases with specific tasks and mile stones for each phase: (i) exploration of product concepts using novel technologies; (ii) development of crude models for feasibility studie s; (iii) construction of laboratory prototypes for functional testing; (iv) selection of manufacturing processes for mass production; and (v ) initiation of pilot run to detect early production problems. The con cept of merging concurrent engineering techniques into the spiral mode l, thereby shortening the product development time and allowing better utilization of manpower, is explored.