Automated synthesis of electromechanical design configurations from empirical analysis of function to form mapping

Abstract

For an ideal design process, designers envision a configuration of components prior to determining dimensions or sizes of these components. Given the breadth of the component space, the design of any future artefact must be carefully planned to take advantage of the diverse set of possibilities. We conjecture that computational design tools could be developed to help designers navigate the design space in creating configurations from detailed specifications of function. In this research, a methodology is developed that extracts design knowledge from an expanding online library of engineering artefacts in the form of grammar rules. From an initial implementation of 189 rules extracted from 23 products, we demonstrate a computational process that builds new design configurations by borrowing concepts from how common functions are solved in related designs.