A systems design approach to manage mechatronics R&D

We propose a systems design procedure to integrate mechanical design, structural prototyping, and servo evaluation through careful comprehension of the servo-mechanical-prototype production cycle commonly employed in mechatronic industries. Our approach focuses on the Modal Parametric Identification (MPI) of key feedback parameters for fast exchange of design specifications and information to enable efficient conduct of product design evaluations and support schedule compression of the R&D project life cycle. Using the commercial Hard Disk Drive (HDD) as a case example, we demonstrate how our approach allows inter-disciplinary specifications to be communicated amongst engineers from different backgrounds to speed up the R&D process for the next generation of intelligent manufacturing. This provides the project management team with powerful decision-making tools for project strategy formulation, and improvements in project outcome are potentially massive because of the low costs of change.