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Problem Definition

Table of Contents 1 Team Vision for Problem Definition Phase 2 Project Summary 3 Understanding Our Customer 4 Use Cases 5 Project Goals and Key Deliverables 6 Customer Requirements 6.1 Original Reading 7 Meeting with Customer 8 Engineering Requirements 8.1 Metrics & Specifications 8.2 Constraints 9 House of Quality 10 Plans for next phase

Team Vision for Problem Definition Phase

• Gain an understanding of the problem statement and confirm our understanding with the customer.
• Communicate the project plan and key deliverables to the customer.
• Verify the project plan with the customer.

Project Summary

Company X needs a stress neutral workpiece holder, capable of holding a 10”-14” diameter optical lens. Currently, Company X has only partial solutions to this problem, and only in specific sizes. Company X desires a more robust, universal solution that maintains a stress-neutral holding, providing precise movement and articulation. The fixture will also provide a more ergonomic solution that allows for easier handling, transport, and cleaning. The three main foci are: simplicity, universality, and cost effectiveness.

The goals of this project include analysis and assessment of current designs, improving current practices, and designing new solutions for the fixture. The holding is not to create cosmetic damage, produce contamination on parts, and should be easily manufactured in volume. Interfacing with existing metrology equipment is vital for use of the holding. The holding is to be lightweight enough for transport by one person, meets size requirements, and to be able to hold part in horizontal and vertical orientations with 5 axes of adjustability.

Incorporating the new information from the Systems Design Review, Company X needs a new solution for which focuses on high aspect ratio lenses. For more information about how the design progressed, see the Systems Design page.

Understanding Our Customer

In order to gain a better understanding of Company X, the team was lucky enough to get the chance tour the facilities at Company X. We were able to get an idea of how their manufacturing process works, and how our fixture will fit into the entire system as a whole.

The information we learned about the manufacturing process can be found here. This is proprietary information and the user must log in with a username and password in order to view.

Use Cases

In order to properly design our system, the team first had to determine who we are truly designing this fixture for within Company X?

It was determined through our interviews and visits with Company X that we determined that the technicians should be our primary focus when designing our fixture. The technicians are the ones who will use the fixture, and so gaining their input is going to be an up most priority.

Project Goals and Key Deliverables

The scope of this project is comprised of three deliverables; a process-improvement plan/documentation, a design of the next generation workpiece holder, and a physical prototype or implementation of the new holder. The process-improvement documentation will review current manufacturing and inspection methods, outline areas of improvement, and offer possible solutions to inefficient processing. The designs of the next generation workpiece holder will encompass detailed and dimensioned CAD drawings as well as manufacturing cost analysis. Finally, the physical prototype or implementation will be a working model of the next generation concept that demonstrates the achievement of customer needs.

MSD I:

• Drawings required for production of the fixture

MSD II:

• Working prototype of the lens handling fixture
• Documentation to train users
• Documentation for process improvement
• Technical paper
• Poster

Customer Requirements

Original Reading

After reviewing the PRP, we understood the project to have the following customer requirements. The customer requirements are ranked on a scale of 1, 3, 9 where 1 is the least important and 9 is the most important. The yellow text is the current focus of the team.

Meeting with Customer

However, after conducting interviews with the technicians, we determined the that the customer requirements truly was more about building the fixture rather than improving the floor plan at Company X.

Engineering Requirements

Metrics & Specifications

We would like to thank all of the technicians and workers at Company X that help us set goal metrics for our projects i.e. Engineering Requirements. At the end of Senior Design II, our design should perform all the requirements listed in this document.

Constraints

After reviewing with our customer and the PRP, we determined that our solution would had to adhere to the following constraints.

• No cantilever beam or point contact deformation
• No particulate generation
• Fixture can hold biconvex, plano convex, biconcave, and plano concave lenses
• Mechanical adjustments will be analog in nature
• Fixture will provide 5 axes of adjustablity
• Fixture will be able to be exposed to serium oxide, opaline wax, methanol, soap, acetone, and skin oils
• Fixture will be able to be handled with latex or nitrile gloves
• Fixture cannot be made of silicone products
• No pneumatic controls
• Fixture will be able to be incorporated into both horizontal and vertical interferometer
• Fixture will be able to withstand heat contact with hands without deforming
• Fixture cannot block the optical axis
• Fixture will hold the lens for the horizontal interferometer
• Fixture will hold the lens for the vertical interferometer

House of Quality

After looking at our Engineering Requirements, we compared our customer requirements to our engineering specifications to make sure we didn't have any extraneous requirements.

Plans for next phase

Our plans for next phase included brainstorming and researching possible solutions for the project. The preliminary project plan is listed below:

However, after a few days, we realized that using Microsoft Project was incompatible with the team resources and time. Therefore, we created a project plan in Google Sheets for easy access. This template was used throughout the rest of the semester.

The document is complete with large tasks items to be completed and completed.

To download all of the Problem Definition Documents, please click Problem Definition Documents link.

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