ENGINEERING DESIGN

Invention: to be the first to make or use something.

Design: To design is either to formulate a plan for the satisfaction of a
specified need or to solve a specific problem. You don’t have to have an
invention in order for it to be a design.
Innovation - looking at something, and using it in a new way. Not
necessarily the first to use it, but in a certain way.

A fundamental way to look at engineering design is that you are trying to

create a solution to a problem.

Engineering design is the process of applying the various techniques and

scientific principles for the purpose of defining a device, a process, or a
system in sufficient detail to permit its realization.

Engineering design is also the total activity necessary to establish and

define solutions to problems not solved before, or new solutions to
problems which have previously been solved in a different way.

CHALLENGES IN DESIGN
 Tradeoffs: there is no right answer.
 Dynamic Life: there is no one time solution, consider design for failure.
 Details.
 Time: deadlines for market, competitors.
 Economics: one of the biggest driving forces in design possibilities in
developing world.
 Use and Misuse: how is device likely to be used and misused,
Consideration of more than functional requirements.
 Ethics: what are the potential uses for things?

The design process is both an art and a science. The following steps may
help get you on the road; they can be used as a way to track and
document the design process and can give you ideas for how to proceed.
“Brute force” engineering options often meet the criteria but somewhere
there is a profound solution, which is simple, cheap, and beautiful. Hold
out for this as long as possible. The design process is generally considered
to be a combination of the following stages:

 Information gathering
 Problem definition
 Design specifications
 Idea generation
 Analysis & experimentation
 Concept evaluation
 Detail design
 Fabrication
 Testing & evaluation

The process is not a linear one, however, as it is often necessary to go back

to revisit earlier stages in light of information which you discover as you
proceed. Experience has shown that the more time spent on the initial
stages of the design, the easier the later stages become.

Some of these characteristics have to do directly with the dimensions, the

material, the processing, and the joining of the elements of the system.
Several characteristics may be interrelated, which affects the configuration
of the total system.
THE DESIGN PROCESS

Step 1: Identification of Need

Information Gathering

We will begin with the information gathering and problem definition phase.
You will be expected to collect information about the project, especially in
terms of the following:
 Specifications for performance of the device: What else exists that does
the same thing that you want to do?
 The context in which it will be used: what size should it be? How much
should it cost? What should the throughput be? How much power does it
need?
 The current state of the art: Will it be used indoors or outdoors? Mostly
by women or men? Year-round or only in the rainy season? Will it be
owned by a group or by individuals? Will it be portable or stationary?
 Related technologies: What technologies perform similar tasks? What
machines work in a similar way?
There are many ways that you can get this information: interviewing
experts and observing users; standard research, using libraries or the
internet; and trying things out for yourself. If you have access to computers,
the internet is a good source of information.

Step 2: Definition of Problem

Problem Framing

Now that you have a good background about the challenge, it’s important to
frame the problem. What aspect of the problem will you be addressing?
Who are your users? Who are your customers? What do your users and/or
customers actually need? It may be different than what they say they want,
they may have framed the problem in a way that suggests a solution. It is
important to go back to the basic requirements and build upon that. Think
carefully about the stakeholders who are involved in this project, and those
that you are including in your solution. Think of several different problem
framings and collect more information about each so that you can choose
the best one.
For example, if we were designing equipment for a beekeepers cooperative
and they asked for a honey press, we could start by designing a press, but
we could also take a step back and look at why they want a press. It is
probably because they want to sell honey.
But what if we talked to the people who want to buy the honey and we
found out that they preferred honey that is still i n the comb? Perhaps they
like to chew on the wax, and use it later for candles or other things. Then we
would not want to design a honey press, but we would want to develop a
method for cutting the honey cleanly, and packaging it for sale.
Or perhaps after talking to the beekeepers you find out that they would like
to be able to re-use the comb, so that the bees do not have to re-build it.
Then you would design a honey extractor that does not damage the comb.
Problem Statement

The problem statement should be a concise description of the design

problem and its context. It should include only the functional requirements
of the device and not components of the solution. The aim of problem
definition is to clearly outline the problem on which the team will focus. Be
sure that the problem defined is measurable and observable. Address the
following questions:
 who (the user)
 what (the functionality of the device)
 where (the environment)
Don’t state the problem as a question or give a solution or cause of the
problem in the statement.

Make a written statement of the problem, as clearly as possible, and also

the purpose for which the machine is to be designed.

Design Specifications

Now that you have an idea of the scope of your project, it is necessary to
determine the user’s needs and convert them into specific design
requirements. Start by generating a list of client needs. When possible, try
to get information directly from the people who will be using your product.
If this is not possible, then identify several people who are knowledgeable
about the topic and get their input. Once you have the list of customer
needs, decide upon the metrics (measurement methods) that you will use to
determine whether you have met these needs. Assign acceptable and ideal
values to these metrics and use this to create the design specifications for
your project. An example of the design requirements for a honey press is
shown in the table below.
Figure 1: Design requirements for a Honey Press

For instance if you are designing a new machine, the factors should be
considered:

 Make selection of the possible mechanisms which will give the

desired motion or group of motions
 Determine the forces acting on and the energy transmitted by each
element of the machine.
 Select the material best suited for each element of the machine.
 Determine the allowable or design stress considering all the factors
that affect the strength of the machine part.
 Determine the size of each member, with a view to preventing undue
distortion or breakage under the applied loads.
 Modify the machine elements in parts to agree with the past
experience and judgement and to facilitate manufacture.
 Make assembly and detail drawings of the machine with complete
specification for the materials and the manufacturing methods, i.e.,
accuracy, surface finish, etc.
Step 3: Synthesis

Idea Generation

Synthesis means to put together. The synthesis of a scheme connecting

possible system elements is sometimes called the invention of the concept
or concept design.

Now that your design problem has been clearly defined and the
specifications have been set out, it is time to concentrate on thinking of
solutions. When there is an existing solution to your problem or a similar
one there are three basic types of design ideas that you may generate:
scaled designs, evolutionary designs or revolutionary designs. A scaled
design can be derived from an existing design that does the job well, and
just needs to be scaled for your application. An evolutionary design can be
created when an existing design is pretty good, but fundamental
improvements can be made. A revolutionary design is a totally new
approach used to achieve the same function as an existing design, but with
better performance. All three approaches can have successful results. In
fact, your final design will probably be a combination of all of them.

Begin by generating ideas on your own (you may have already done a little
of this while you were doing research into the problem definition). Try to
think of as many different ways as possible to solve the problem. Be sure
that you do not focus on a single approach. Use sketches and notes in your
design notebook to record your ideas. Be sure to use large, well-labeled
sketches so that others will be able to understand them. Some ideas will be
at the system level and others at a more detailed level. Keep track of them
all. Think of at least ten ideas for your project and record them in your
design notebook. As a rule of thumb, it is always important to note down
ideas as they come, as such ideas can prove useful in the design process.
They may be ideas for the overall system or for the sub-systems.

Once you feel like have exhausted your ideas, try to generate more. One way
to do this is through a process called bisociation. In this approach, you
choose a topic that may seem unrelated to your topic, and then think of
ideas that bring these two ideas together. For example, you may be
generating ideas for the charcoal project, and choose the bisociation topic
of shoes. Then you might think of how you could use shoes as a material to
make the honey press, how a shoe could operate the honey press, how the
shape of the shoe could be incorporated into the honey press design, how
shoe manufacturing methods could be adapted to make charcoal, how
charcoal could be used in making shoes, or how it might be used to absorb
odors in shoes. And then you might decide to follow up on one of the more
promising ideas. How charcoal might absorb odors, or perhaps other
contaminants, perhaps chemicals in water, perhaps removing pesticides
from ground water, and perhaps the charcoal could be formed into a
briquettes in a way that you could regulate the pore size, and then it could
filter bacteria from the water as well. This leaves you with the idea of
making charcoal water filters for removing chemical and bacterial
contaminants. This might actually be a good idea.
There are many strategies for creative idea generation; brainstorming and
bisociation are just a couple.

Concept Evaluation

Your next task is to choose which of your many ideas you will concentrate
on in your design solution. It is often difficult to do this as ideas tend to
take on a life of their own and you will find that you each have favorites. It
is important to judge as objectively as possible. You will need to
consolidate your various ideas into designs that you can compare. You
might consider group together ideas that are similar and combine them
into a single solution. Try to narrow it down to three to five different
concepts, each of which may be a marriage between several of your
original ideas.
Pugh Chart Analysis

A Pugh chart is a tool that helps evaluate ideas by setting up a list of

characteristics and judging each idea in terms of the individual criteria.
This helps to create a more objective and structured selection process.
One idea is chosen as the datum, or the idea to which all others will be
compared. It is a good approach to choose a fairly simple idea as the datum,
as it will be easier to do the comparisons than if you choose one of your
more complicated ideas. Revisit your problem statement and your list of
design specifications to determine the criteria and characteristics that you
will use to judge your potential solutions. For each of the criteria, decide if
the option you are evaluating is the same (0), better (+) or worse (-) than
your datum. Tally the results for each option and determine which idea is
the best. You may want to weight some of the criteria more heavily (for
example, safety might be deemed more important than portability when
evaluating your idea, and therefore you may choose to double the weight of
that criterion). You may also find that when you make your final selection,
you will choose characteristics from several of your options and combine
them to form the final design; however you should be careful not to make
your project too complex.

Figure 2: SAMPLE PUGH CHART

Step 4: Analysis and Optimization

Analysis and Experimentation

Now that you have chosen the final concept, it is necessary to establish that
critical subsystems will perform as required. In many cases, performance
can be predicted by calculations using data obtained during the research
phase. In others, experimentation will be required. The experimental setup
may closely resemble the contemplated prototype (in which case it's
sometimes called a "breadboard" after the practice, in the early days of
radio, of building the circuit up on a wooden board used for cutting bread).
Or, it might be much simpler, simply containing the functional element to
be tested. For example, using a mechanical linkage. If linkage dynamics are
important, an accurate breadboard would be necessary. If only kinematics
are required, a Lego model, or even cardboard model might be sufficient.
We have noted, and we emphasize, that design is an iterative process in
which we proceed through several steps, evaluate the results, and then
return to an earlier phase of the procedure. Thus, we may synthesize several
components of a system, analyze and optimize them, and return to
synthesis to see what effect this has on the remaining parts of the system.
For example, the design of a system to transmit power requires attention to
the design and selection of individual components (e.g., gears, bearings,
shaft).
However, as is often the case in design, these components are not
independent. In order to design the shaft for stress and deflection, it is
necessary to know the applied forces.
If the forces are transmitted through gears, it is necessary to know the gear
specifications in order to determine the forces that will be transmitted to
the shaft. But stock gears come with certain bore sizes, requiring knowledge
of the necessary shaft diameter.
Detailed Design

Once the performance potential of the critical subsystems is established, it

is necessary to work out all the details that will make a workable prototype.
This will vary greatly from project to project but includes aspects such as:
dimensions and tolerances, material selection, kinematics of assemblies
and sub-assemblies, and calculations of energy and power requirements.
The specialized knowledge of strength of materials, theory of machines,
thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, electromagnetic, etc. is used for
detailing each individual part of the designed product. Further, it is not
only to ascertain their primary functions, but also to maintain efficiency,
required degree of accuracy, reliability, safety margins, quality standards,
appearance, features, etc. Many times, a good design has to be abandoned
for problems of materials, procurement, material conversion, fabrication
and assembly. The manufacturing method is strongly influenced by the
material selected as well as the quantity desired. For minimum
manufacturing cost to be there, the method of manufacturing should be
such that the following are avoided.
(a)Heavy weight of material (b) Difficult assembly (c) Reclamping of work
(d) Rejects (e) Auxiliary equipment (f) Finishing operations (g) Special
purpose tools (h) Expensive machinery operations (i) Change of
machine.

Every component of your project should be designed to best fulfill its

purpose. Your first layout will not be your final one; continual refinement is
possible until you run out of time, but the difference in quality from the
first layout to the last can be enormous.

Keeping all these considerations in mind, start the process of producing

technical drawings of your proposed design. Make sure to have all critical
custom-made components drawn up either by hand or using computer
programs such as SolidWorks or AutoCAD (we don't need drawings of
screws, nuts, off-the shelf parts or banana leaves!). Today’s advanced CAD
software is intuitive and suggestive. They also contain a standard design/ or
parts library which can help designers meet necessary standards and norms
of design.
Also, with each drawing make a list of materials that you will need in order
to fabricate the parts you have designed, a list of processes needed to
fabricate each part and denote where they will be made (a small-scale
machine shop, a large plastics factory, etc.).

Fabrication

Now it is time to turn your ideas into reality, generally one begins by
building a proof of concept prototype. In this case, the parts are typically
fabricated on an individual basis and may not be made in the same way, or
of the same material, as the final product. A careful planning of this phase
will save you valuable time, unnecessary waiting times for your raw
materials or components, and stressful last-minute hard-work.
Step 5: Evaluation

Testing and Evaluation

Once you have built a prototype, it is necessary to test it and see if the
design really satisfies the needs. Now is the time to go back to the design
specifications outlined in the early stages of the design process and verify
that the device works according to the given specifications. Devise
techniques for measuring the performance of your device for each of your
design specifications. As part of this exercise, think of how your device
could be improved. Are there ways you can make it cheaper, faster, better?
Try to lower the part count or remove material. Is it as simple as possible
(but not simpler? Is it reliable? Will it compete successfully with similar
products? Is it economical to manufacture and to use? Is it easily
maintained and adjusted? Can a profit be made from its sale or use? How
likely is it to result in product-liability lawsuits? Is it likely that recalls will
be needed to replace defective parts or systems?
Not only should the technical performance of the device be tested, but also
the human factors; test for usability and ergonomics. Have people try your
device and get their feedback. Whenever possible, have the actual users try
the device, if this is not feasible, try to find people with as close to the same
background as possible. Have users try your device without as little
instruction or guidance as possible, and analyze their interactions. You can
observe how intuitive, easy and safe the device is to use.

Use all the information gathered at this stage to inform the next iteration of
the design process. Consider revising the design specifications and the
original ideal and desired values. Identify the subcomponents that need to
be revisited or redesigned, and outline the goals for how to move the project
forward.
Step 6: Presentation
Communicating the design to others is the final, vital presentation step in
the design process. Undoubtedly, many great designs, inventions, and
creative works have been lost to posterity simply because the originators
were unable or unwilling to properly explain their accomplishments to
others. Presentation is a selling job. The engineer, when presenting a new
solution to administrative, management, or supervisory persons, is
attempting to sell or to prove to them that their solution is a better one.
Unless this can be done successfully, the time and effort spent on obtaining
the solution have been largely wasted. When designers sell a new idea, they
also sell themselves. If they are repeatedly successful in selling ideas,
designs, and new solutions to management, they begin to receive salary
increases and promotions; in fact, this is how anyone succeeds in his or her
profession. The primary role of a sales engineer is to market products to the
end users.
DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS:
Sometimes the strength required of an element in a system is an important
factor in the determination of the geometry and the dimensions of the
element. In such a situation we say that strength is an important design
consideration. When we use the expression design consideration, we are
referring to some characteristic that influences the design of the element or,
perhaps, the entire system. Usually quite a number of such characteristics
must be considered and prioritized in a given design situation. Many of the
important ones are as follows:
(a) Profitability
(b) Lifetime
(c) Efficiency
(d) Environmental Impact
(e) Social Impact
(f) Durability
(g) Ease of Assembly and Disassembly
(h) Transparency
(i) Sourcing
(j) Reusability
(k) User Needs
(l) Appearance
(m) Scalable
(n) Desirability
(o) Cost
(p) Materials
(q) Portability
(r) Lubrication
(s) Maintenance & Repair
(t) Cultural Acceptance
(u) Operation Safety
(v) Ergonomics
(w) Reliability
(x) Compliance with state standards.