Design for Six Sigma Solution

Product Behavior Quantify the quality of products with ANSYS® DesignXplorerTM

Characterizing the behavior of a product
(a part or an assembly of parts) under oper- Design for Six Sigma designs quality into a product. By assessing the variations that a product
ational conditions can be done in three ways: experiences during manufacture and use, it is possible to make a product that performs its intended
Empirical Characterization function regardless of these variations; such a product is “robust,”and therefore, Design for Six Sigma
Empirical Characterization refers to is sometimes called Robust Design.
creating a prototype (or prototypes) of the
product hopefully replicating the manufac-
turing steps that are to be used in a pro- Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) is an analysis technique to determine the extent to which uncertainties
duction run of the product. The product is in the model affect the results of an analysis. Based on a probabilistic characterization, Design for Six
then tested to determine its behavior and Sigma enables users to quantify the quality of a product by addressing issues such as minimizing
to make final judgment on whether the
warranty costs and assessing the reliability of the product. DFSS goes one step further than a proba-
product will perform successfully in the
field. Typically this judgment is of a yes-no bilistic characterization by allowing users to optimize design variables to achieve a particular proba-
nature. In other words, the product will fail bilistic result such as Six Sigma, which, including long-term effects, is 3.4 failures in one million parts!
or not; hence its design is acceptable
or not.
Six Sigma initiatives try to optimize the manufacturing process such that it automatically produces
Deterministic Characterization parts conforming to Six Sigma quality. In contrast, DFSS optimizes the design itself such that the part
Deterministic Characterization typically conforms to Six Sigma quality even with variations in manufacturing. For Design for Six Sigma and
refers to an analysis of the product with-
out testing it. This analysis could range Robust Design, quality is an explicit goal of the optimization.
from simple engineering handbook
calculations to elaborate finite element The ANSYS® DesignXplorer VTTM and DesignXplorer solutions provide users with the ability to
analyses (FEA). Once again, the typical
create a Robust Design by allowing the user to define both Design Variables and Uncertainty Variables,
judgment is of a yes-no nature.
and then optimize a set of reliability goals for quantities such as fatigue life, stress or deflection.
Probabilistic Characterization
Probabilistic Characterization quantifies
the reliability or quality of the product by
means of a statistical analysis. Proba-
bilistic characterization combines the
deterministic characterization, either
handbook or FEA analysis, with statistical
analysis tools to address the effect of
statistical variability and uncertainty influ-
encing the products behavior.
Probabilistic analysis typically involves
four areas of statistical variability: the
geometric shape, the material properties,
the loading and the boundary conditions.
For example, the statistical variability of
the geometry of a product would try to
capture the product-to-product differ-
ences due to manufacturing imperfections
quantified by the manufacturing
tolerances. Because the statistical analy-
sis typically requires many data points, a
combination of computer-based FEA
analysis with statistical analysis is the
most time- and cost-efficient method in
practice. Unlike the first two methods,
probabilistic characterization provides a
probability of success or failure and not
just a simple yes-no evaluation. For
instance, a probabilistic analysis could
determine that one part in 1,000,000
would fail or what the probability is of a
product surviving its expected useful life.
www.ansys.com
Product Features Variational Technology
Look beyond traditional aspects of simulation and analyze entire systems with the ANSYS
DesignXplorer VT software can be added
DesignXplorer VT software, a Variational Technology solution that gives users a broader view of
to any ANSYS license supporting struc-
tural and thermal analysis and can create design concepts providing complete FEA results for every design point. Depending on the analysis
a response surface of FEA results for problem, Variational Technology can provide acceleration factors between 10 and several thousand.
linear elastic static structural, normal With Variational Technology, users can approach product design decisions much more efficiently.
modes or linear static thermal analyses.

The DesignXplorer VT module works Using ANSYS Variational Technology to automatically calculate the entire design envelope within a
within the ANSYS® WorkbenchTM software single finite element solution, DesignXplorer VT software allows users to perform quick and accurate
to select geometric CAD parameters or
geometric parameters from ANSYS
what-if scenarios to periodically test design ideas. A traditional design of experiments (DOE)
DesignModeler, discrete regions, element approach requires many solutions to capture the behavioral changes due to parameter variations. For
parameters, material properties and loads. discrete parameters, the practical limit using traditional methods is about 10 discrete parameters, but
the DesignXplorer VT product handles more than 100 discrete parameters even when combined with
The DesignXplorer VT product works
within the ANSYS environment to select other parameter types.
material properties, real constant values
(e.g., thickness) and whether elements are The DesignXplorer VT solution allows designers and analysts to make intelligent design decisions
active or inactive, loads and ParaMesh
parameters. given multiple competing objectives. These variations can include geometric CAD parameters, the
ANSYS® ParaMeshTM product parameters, element properties, material properties and load variations.
Analysis Capabilities The DesignXplorer VT solution’s proprietary Variational Technology offers the capacity to study,
Analyses include:
Structural linear static
quantify and graph the structural analysis response to alternative design parameters.
Normal modes
Harmonic Response with the ANSYS DesignXplorer VT solution addresses many kinds of parameters:
Frequency Sweep Module VT
Geometric variations (CAD or ParaMesh)
Static linear thermal
Discrete variations (active or inactive status of spot welds, stiffening ribs, bolts, etc.)
Geometric Variations: Element property variations (shell or layer thickness, spring stiffness, point mass)
CAD solid modeling parameters Material variations (engineered plastics, composites, metals)
DesignModeler parameters
ParaMesh parameters Load variations (inertia and surface structural and thermal loads)

Discrete Variation (active or inactive) of DesignXplorer

Elements: COMBIN14, MASS21,
LINK180, SHELL181, PLANE182, What if your analysis goes beyond linear statics and
PLANE183, SOLID185, SOLID186, normal modes? Not to worry, the DesignXplorer VT soft-
SOLID187, BEAM188, BEAM189 ware also contains the DesignXplorer product, which is
Element Property Variation of Elements:
based on Design of Experiments. The DesignXplorer
COMBIN14, MASS21, SHELL181 solution works from within the ANSYS® WorkbenchTM
interface to perform DOE analyses of any Workbench
Material Property Variation of Elements:
simulation, including those with CAD parameters.
LINK180, SHELL181, PLANE182,
PLANE183, SOLID185, SOLID186, Although it requires more analyses to be performed and is
SOLID187, PLANE55, SOLID70, typically slower than Variational Technology, DOE is not
SOLID87, SOLID90 limited in the types of analyses that it can be used with. In
Load Variation: Inertia Loads (All 18x fact, DesignXplorer software can be used with ANSYS®
Elements and MASS21), Surface Parametric Design LanguageTM (APDL)-based files to
Pressures (SURF153 and SURF154), perform DOE on existing or new ANSYS analyses.
Heat Transfer Film Coefficients (SURF151
and SURF152), Bulk Temperature,
DesignXplorer allows you to perform optimization and Design for Six Sigma with any application or
Heat Flux sequence of applications, including in-house codes, by using the third-party plug-in.

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