Support of Conceptual Design of Engineering Systems Applying Functional Modeling (2nd Report, Support Technique of Component Assignment to Functions by Effectively Using Past Cases)

This study investigates a computer support system applying functional modeling techniques for the conceptual design phase of engineering systems. The previous paper proposed a systematic representation of design information from the viewpoints of goals, functions, and structure. This paper describes a support system of component assignment to functions by effectively using past design cases, where two case retrieval techniques are proposed. The one called “function flow simplification matching” simplifies the function flow of a case and compares it with the function flow specified by the designer. This matching technique realizes flexible case retrieval. The other is the utilization of ordinal component hierarchy data abstracted from past similar plant designs. The data is used to go into the details of design structure step-by-step. The feasibility of the component assignment technique is investigated by some design trials of a fluidized refuse incineration plant.