Adaptive Product, Process and Tooling Design Strategy for Optimal Dimensional Quality of Automotive Body Assemblies

Research investigations have shown that the dimensional quality is deeply rooted in the whole process of the product development, from product, process and tooling design, the tooling manufacturing process, to the production. Unlike rigid body assembly, automotive body assembly has its unique characteristics. The final dimensions of automotive bodies depend not only on the variations/deviations and rigidity of components, tooling/process variation, but also on the product structure, connection type and assembly sequence. An adaptive strategy for automotive body development is here by presented to exploit these unique features. By the adaptive product, process and tooling design strategy, the dimensional variation/deviation for the key dimensions can be significantly reduced and the die tryout time be shorten with significant cost saving.