Evaluating the unfastening effort in design for disassembly and serviceability

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2-1-2004

Abstract

Disassembly is the process of physically separating a product into its parts or subassemblies. Recently, product designers are being challenged to address the concept of 'ease of disassembly' while configuring new designs. This is driven by the need for new products to undergo a design for disassembly and serviceability (DfDS) analysis. DfDS promotes design features and attributes, which reduce the subsequent disassembly costs. The disassembly process commonly involves an unfastening action. In this paper we present the unfastening effort analysis (U-effort) model, which helps designers to evaluate and select their fastener options. The U-effort model was developed from an experimental investigation of the most common fastener types used in industry. For each fastener type, the U-effort model identifies several causal attributes, and uses these to derive the U-effort index for a given case. From our experiments, we found that the most significant causal attributes are usually related to fastener size, shape or operational characteristics. The U-effort model is easily integrated into DfDS analysis schemes. The disassembly times generated from the U-effort model can be used to perform economic analysis of product service and/or end-of-life disassembly operations.

Identifier

1642446962 (Scopus)

Publication Title

Journal of Engineering Design

External Full Text Location

https://doi.org/10.1080/0954482031000150152

ISSN

09544828

First Page

69

Last Page

90

Issue

1

Volume

15

Fund Ref

State of New Jersey Commission on Science and Technology

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