Integrating CAD and manufacturing intelligence through features and objects

Abstract This paper reports on two related investigations into the use of features and object concepts to integrate manufacturing intelligence into design and manufacturing and to provide a common integration path between design and manufacturing. (Manufacturing intelligence is here used to mean data representations, that can encapsulate a range of data and other associated knowledge. Features, objects and knowledgebase frames and rules are examples of such representations.) The first investigation examined the feasibility of integrating manufacturing intelligence with CAD-based design by coupling an object-oriented methodology and a design-by-feature system. In a pilot implementation, object-oriented concepts such as encapsulation, polymorphism and inheritance have been combined with features in an AutoLISP package which runs in conjunction with a design-by-feature (DbF) package. The DbF package is based on a form of B-rep model and implemented in AutoCAD. The benefits of combining CAD and objects are di...