The introduction of knowledge based engineering for design for manufacture in the automotive industry

The approach that IDC took to help implement knowledge based engineering to Chrysler was: (1) to identify small, more easily defined problems that could result in large and immediate savings rather than trying to solve a large and complex problem that could take man years to develop; (2) to assist the users to achieve their task, rather than try and replace users to generate enthusiasm and user ´buy-in´. Users then support the application of knowledge based engineering to more complex problems; and (3) identify and support the downstream manufacturing processes early in the design and consequently support concurrent engineering. This paper presents three case studies that illustrate this approach and show the benefits that have been gained