SPAW: a design tool for planning a manufacturing process in a concurrent engineering environment

Abstract An efficient integration of CAD, CAM and CAE activities, which accommodates design and process constraints, will allow simultaneous development and resolution of important design and manufacturing decisions. The lack of a fully integrated software environment means that communication problems between the designers and other departments will continue to cause lengthy delays in development time and increased costs. A prototype CAM module, called SPAW, has been developed to assist in planning a manufacturing process, specifically the Gas Metal Arc Welding process, and is also designed to be integrated directly into a design-oriented Concurrent Engineering (CE) environment. The capabilities of the SPAW illustrate a conceptual model that has potential to plan other manufacturing processes, thus moving closer to the goal of a complete CE environment. An example is provided to demonstrate both the capability of SPAW and the operational concept of integrating a manufacturing planning tool with CAD and CAE design tools.