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Integrating Plm Methods Into The Undergraduate Curriculum
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Frame, Russell |
| Copyright Year | 2004 |
| Abstract | The methodology used to design new products is changing as computer technology advances. Companies worldwide are adopting Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solutions to stay competitive. This technology allows control of all aspects of the design process from initial concept to obsolescence and disposal. A database manages all information, controls access to data, and lets diverse businesses participate in the supply chain. Companies in the US must implement these methods to remain competitive. Universities need to integrate PLM methods into their curricula to supply graduates with relevant skills. Universities will face challenges implementing PLM into their curricula. Since PLM is a rapidly emerging technology, traditional academic materials do not exist. Assessment of the skills gained by students will be difficult since PLM is a design methodology, not a specific skill. Finally, PLM methods must span the entire curriculum, not be the subject of discrete classes. WSU is currently developing a test curriculum with a select group of students. Future curriculum modification will utilize information from this group. Anticipated modifications include illustrating the applicability of core skills within PLM, transferring student-generated models from class to class to demonstrate new concepts using familiar material, and emphasizing PLM methods in design classes. The final assessment of PLM skills will be based on designs presented by student groups. Additionally, WSU will obtain complex models from industrial partners to expose the students to “real world” engineering practices and solutions. Our goal is to produce students familiar with PLM who will be competitive in the job market. A Brief History of PLM Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) methods are a direct descendent of industrial trends started in the United States directly following World War II. During the war, most of the industrial capability of the Axis (Japan, Italy, and Germany) was destroyed. After the armistice, the Allies (the US, Great Britain, and France) rebuilt the industrial base in the defeated nations so that both their local economies and the overall world economy would grow and flourish. The facilities built were brand new and stateof-the art, so the newest methodologies were implemented during plant design and business planning. P ge 964.1 Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering Table 1: List of Commonly Used Acronyms In Japan, businesses used an idealized model of the US industrial base to create an initial system based on copying products made in the US. Unfortunately, this system produced products perceived as low quality imitations of the high quality US made products. Japanese companies wanted to compete in the free-world market, and recognized that higher quality products would allow them to do so. During the 1960s, Japanese companies formalized the practice of specifying quality as part of the design process, and called the practice Quality Function Deployment (QFD) . These trends continued, and updated practices spread back to the US during the 1970s. As technology moved forward, the ideals were further refined into Concurrent Engineering (CE) by the 1990s. These early methods and design philosophies laid the groundwork for the most modern industrial paradigm, PLM. (A list of commonly used acronyms is given in Table 1) The first of the methods, QFD, emphasized the overall quality of the product, but did not consider any other factors. In order to facilitate faster time-to-market, CE methods allow a product and its manufacturing plan to be developed simultaneously , but did not move past the production of a part. Realizing that a more comprehensive method was needed for production of large, complex, and technologically superior products, industries developed a method that would account for the entire usable life of a product. Additionally, the Internet made it practical to securely share design data around the world . In the early 1990s, the best features of QFD, CE, and the sharing of data worldwide were combined into a new methodology. This processes provided the basis for PLM, which is sometimes called “cradle to grave” engineering. One of the major strengths of PLM is that it uses extremely powerful software to share data, using the internet, and merge ideas into the final design. This software allows users to access parts of the design without having to translate file types or worry about errors in the data. In the PLM environment, the specifications (also called needs or requirements) are fully determined before any parts are designed. These specifications Acronym Refers to PLM Product Lifecycle Management QFD Quality Function Deployment IPPD Integrated Product & Process Development CE Concurrent Engineering PDM Product Database Manager KBE Knowledge Based Engineering CAD Computer Aided Design FEA Finite Element Analysis CTR Critical Thinking Rubric |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://peer.asee.org/integrating-plm-methods-into-the-undergraduate-curriculum.pdf |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
