Derivative Products Supporting Product Development and Design for Assembly

Fast time to markets becoming increasingly important through dynamic product life cycles. An assembly planning in early project stages is necessary, which evaluates assembly procedures and the mountability. The use of derivative products offers this possibility since the simplified form can be used for examining important steps in assembly processes as well as for testing maintenance processes. In particular, the use of equipment and the arrangement of components are relevant. The division of labour between workers as well as the process planning can be examined with derivative products. The collected knowledge can be used for planning as well as for design. It supports the Design for Assembly (DFA) since effects of physical properties on the assembly process can be transferred back to the design stage. This paper describes the properties and possible applications of derivative products. In addition, it shows the use of derivative products for the development of new products and describes the advantages regarding conventional DFA methods.