Development of automated fixture planning systems

Fixturing is an important manufacturing activity. The computer-aided fixtur e design technique is being rapidly developed to reduce the lead time invol ved in manufacturing planning. An automated fixture configuration design sy stem has been developed to select automatically modular fixture components and place them in position with satisfactory assembly relationships. In thi s paper, an automated fixturing planning system is presented in which fixtu ring surfaces and points are automatically determined based on workpiece ge ometry and operational information. Fixturing surface accessibility, featur e accuracy, and fixturing stability are the main concerns in the fixture pl anning. The system development, the fixture planning decision procedure, an d an implementation example are presented in the paper.