A customized design tool incorporating web and client functions for new mechanical presses

Abstract. To improve the design efficiency and consistency of many new mechanical presses developed by a few engineers, an application with two tabs was proposed to incorporate a web browser and a client window, respectively, for the press modification and the new press design. The press modification is based on the standardized press data in server while the new press design adopts the functions of Computer-Aided Design (CAD) and Word processing tools in local computers. For the press modification: (1) a case retrieval function was developed to find similar features of standardized press information that was then adapted to meet the new custom order; (2) some structural parameters and component selections were adjusted and checked by the calculation algorithms and material properties; (3) within the browser tab, design document was eventually reported. For the new press design: (1) besides the BOM templates, two dimensional (2D) sketch templates were summarized for non-standard parts or assemblies including the machine frame, crank, links, slider, work-table, etc.; (2) the slider movement design and dimensional allocation of press components were performed according to a series of interactive dialogs, answers and views with regard to the custom order; (3) the dot net framework was adopted to integrate Solidworks, Auto CAD and Word functions to generate parts, assemblies, drawings and the Bill Of Materials (BOM) from the 2D sketch and BOM templates using the dimensional allocations and the design results. Examples validated the feasibility of the proposed tool.