A CAD Template Approach to Support Web-Based Customer Centric Product Design

Abstract

In order to provide products that can be tailored to the need of the customer, it is necessary to integrate the customer into the design process. In this paper we present a mass customization computer-aided design (CAD) framework that helps to integrate the customer into the design of user-configurable products. A template approach, which considers both modularity and scaling, is utilized to concisely represent a CAD model of the entire family. The system accepts user selections and parameters to automatically create a CAD model of the customized product in real time and then shows the model to the user. The system is implemented using PRO/ENGINEER and demonstrated through customization of bicycle frames.