Abstract
It is well recognized that manufacturers of consumer goods throughout the world are facing major new demands, including shorter product life-cycles and increasing competition. In response, companies are restructuring and moving away from traditional process-centred work practices in favour of concurrent engineering methods. In particular, design for manufacture has gained widespread recognition as a means of reducing production costs and lead times. However, optimal design for manufacture is difficult to achieve using current-day work organization and business structures. An underlying problem is the lack of a scientific framework for production. To address this need, this paper proposes a radical and far-reaching new manufacturing paradigm based upon on building production systems from standardized modular machines. The manufacturing concept, termed modular production systems (MPS), is aimed specifically at ’hard‘ low- to medium-technology consumer products, as typified by goods such as children‘s toys and kitchen appliances. The rationale for MPS as a means of enabling concurrent product and production system design is put forward, and the long-term implications and work required to establish the concept are discussed.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Canny, J. F. and Goldberg, K. Y. (1992) A `RISC’ paradigm for industrial robots, Technical report RAMP 92-3, University of California, Berkeley CA.
Carlisle, B. (1989) The changing nature of assembly automation, in Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Assembly Automation, IFS publications, Bedford UK, pp. 31–37.
Carlisle, B. (1991) Is US robotics research of any use to US industry? IEEE Robotics and Automation Society Newsletter, July.
Cohen, S. (1988) The myth of the post-industrial economy. Siemens Review, March/April 4–19.
Davis, R. K. (1991) A systems approach to machinery design and implementation, in Proceedings of Eurotech Direct, Machine Systems Vol., I. Mech E., 2-4 July, pp.19–24.
Dewhurst, P and Boothroyd, G. (1983) Computer aided design for assembly. Assembly Engineering, February, 18–22.
Dym C. L. (1994) Engineering Design: A Synthesis of Views, Cambridge University Press.
Enright, R. (1994) Automated design of modular production systems, Internal Report, Dept of Electronic Engineering, University of Hull, UK.
Hu, W., Kong, Z., Zhu, G., and Yu, J. (1993) Modules for modular design of machine tools, in Proceeding of International Conference on Engineering Design, The Hague, 17-19 August, Heunsta Zurich pp. 1287–1294.
Lawrence, A. (1986) Taking off slowly. Industrial Computing, April, 19–22.
Merchant, E. (1985) The importance of flexible manufacturing systems to the realization of full computer integrated manufacturing in Flexible Manufacturing Systems, Warnecke, H. J. (ed), IFS (Publications) Ltd. and Springer-Verlag.
Mittal, S., Dym, C. L. and Marjana, M. (1986) PRIDE: An expert system for the design of paper handling systems. IEEE Computer, 19(7), 21–41.
Ngo, B. K. and Leow, G.L. (1994) Modular fixture design: a designer's assistant. International Journal of Production Research, 32, 2083–2104.
O'Meara (1992) A knowledge-based CAP system for the automated selection of actuators, MSc thesis, University of Hull, UK.
Oey, V. (1993) Specification and modelling of plastics moulding machines for modular production systems, MSc Thesis, University of Hull, UK.
Pawar, K. S. (1994) Organisation and managerial issues, in Concurrent Engineering, Concepts, Implementation and Practice, Syan, C. S. and Menon, U. (ed), Chapman & Hall, London, pp. 49–74.
Ralston, D. and Munton, T. (1987) Computer integrated manufacturing. Computer-Aided Engineering Journal, August 167–174.
Redford, A. and Lo, E. (1986) Robots for Assembly, Open University Press, Milton Keynes, UK.
Roobeek, A. and Abbing, M. R. (1988) The international implication of CIM. International Journal of CIM, 1(1), 3–12.
Rogers, G. G. (1990). Modular production systems: a control scheme for actuators, PhD Thesis, Loughborough University, UK.
Salzberg, S. and Watkins, M. (1990) Managing information for concurrent engineering: challenges and barriers. Research in Engineering Design, 2, 35–52.
Shina, G. S. (1991) Special report: concurrent engineering, IEEE Spectrum, July 22–37.
Stoll, H. S. (1986) Design for manufacture: an overview. ASME Applied Mechanics Reviews, 39(9), 1356–1364.
Swift, K. G. (1987) Knowledge-Based Design for Manufacture, Kogan-Page, London, pp. 11–18.
Syan, C. S. (1994a) Introduction to concurrent engineering, in Concurrent Engineering, Concepts, Implementation and Practice, London, Syan, C. S. and Menon, U. (ed), Chapman and Hall, London, pp. 2–23.
Syan, C. S. (1994b) Introduction, in Concurrent Engineering, Concepts, Implementation and Practice, Syan, C. S. and Menon, U. (ed), Chapman & Hall, London.
Theobald, G., Culley, S. J., Ajdenan, N. J. S. and Vogwell, J. (1993) The modelling of engineering subassemblies based on standard components, in Proceedings of International Conference on Engineering Design, The Hague, 17-19 August, Heunsta, Zurich.
Tsukune, H., Tsukamoto, M., Matsushita, T., Tomita, F., Okeda, K., Ogasawara, T., Takese, K. and Yuba, T. (1993) Modular manufacturing. Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, 4, 163–181.
Voelker, H. and Requicha, A. (1977) Geometric modelling of mechanical parts and processes. Computer 10(12), 48–57.
Watson, P. and Pullen, J. (1989) Engineering for competive advantage. Proceeding of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers Part B: Journal of Manufacturing, 203, 69–74.
Weston, R. H., Harrison, R., Bootts, A. H. and Moore, P.R. (1989). Universal machine control system primitives for modular distributor manipulator systems. International Journal of Production Research, 27(3).
Whitney, D. (1990) Designing the design process. Research in Engineering Design, 2, 3–13.
Yoshikawa, H. (1994). Manufacturing in the future-some topics of IMS, in Distributed Automonous Robotic Systems Asama, A. et al. (eds), Springer-Verlag, Berlin.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
ROGERS , G.G., BOTTACI , L. Modular production systems: a new manufacturing paradigm. Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing 8, 147–156 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018560922013
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018560922013