Speaker: Professor Craig Chapman
Presentation title: The Utilisation of Knowledge for the rapid development of complex design engineering
Presentation abstract: A Need to Rethink the Solution? – CAD has evolved from simple drafting and analysis tools. Our present systems automate small and often isolated tasks within the overall engineering process. CAD systems have been extended by programmatic means to assist the engineer in localised application areas and in the optimisation of specialist part objects. To go further we must take a holistic view of design.
To overcome the limitations set by the traditional design tools, we are now seeing an evolution in our design systems, one where the knowledge of the actual process is being represented. The specifications are being transformed into sets of attributed objects, which act together to satisfy the specification. One of the methods being used and researched to acquire, represent, store, reason and communicate the intent of the design process is Knowledge Based Engineering.
The systems should give back the time to be an engineer. A true CAD system should be able to draw from a company’s natural knowledge base, the accumulated experience of the workforce and more importantly have the ability to utilise that knowledge in the pursuit of a solution(s).
This talk will explore the modelling of complex products and the utilisation of our knowledge, showing examples and discussing potential future methods to model the complex systems being automated.
Biography: Professor Craig Chapman CEng is Associate Head for Research and Director of the Knowledge Based Engineering Lab in the School of Engineering, Design and Manufacturing Systems, Birmingham City University.
He has worked at an international level working in Europe, USA and the UK, holding positions in industry from Director, Principal Design Engineer, Design Group Leader and Senior Applications Consultant.
The main focus of Craig’s career has been research, development and the application of design engineering automation and the development of Knowledge Based Engineering (KBE) solutions, enabling companies to rapidly respond to design engineering changes and explore multiple solutions with consideration to all life cycle phases. Craig is a visiting Lecturer at the University of Warwick and NTNU, he also delivers KBE courses into industry. KBE Research partners have included Rolls-Royce, Jaguar Land Rover, BAE Systems, Morgan Motor Company, Daewoo, Ascamm Technological Centre and TechnoSoft Inc. Current industry sponsored research is focusing on platform independent models to represent engineering products and processes and the enhancement of Knowledge Based Engineering development by the use of MBSE in a concurrent framework, C-DAM (Concurrent – Design Automation Methodology).
