Product Element Sensitivity Measurement Under Multiple Exogenous Uncertainties Considering Change Propagation Behavior

In the flexible design for a complex product, it's necessary to identify the product element's sensitivity to multiple exogenous uncertainties at initial design stage. In the traditional method, relation transitivity is a basic assumption in the change propagation network. This assumption is not always a realistic situation in the product system design. In order to make the sensitivity parameter better reflect the change propagation behavior, this paper provides a sensitivity identification method based on the Multi-Domain Matrix (MDM). A change attenuation parameter is introduced, and the combined influence matrix of the MDM is obtained using the powers of the MDM. Based on the combined influence matrix, the sensitivity value of a product element to all exogenous factors is obtained. A case study on the design of a High Speed Rail (HSR) system is used to illustrate the application of this approach. Results show that the proposed approach can identify the sensitivity of a product element more reasonably.