SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION

While CAD packages differ greatly, the steps a product development organization should take to implement a CAD system are very similar. Basically, the plan should address every functional area in the company that will be impacted by the transition, from design and engineering through manu-facturing and information systems. At a minimum, the CAD implementation plan should contain these elements:

• Standards. A set of documents that define recommended practices for using the CAD system.

• Installation. The set of procedures that define the hardware requirements and how the CAD soft-ware is installed and configured.

• Training. The set of procedures and schedule for training the user base on how to operate the new CAD system.

• Legacy data. The set of procedures for how legacy design data will be managed and reused.

• Data Management. The standard for how the company will define, modify, manage, and archive design data created in the new CAD system.

• Evaluation. A method for evaluating the effectiveness of the CAD implementation such as an accurate methodology for calculating ROI.

9.7.1 Standards

Manufacturers should collect and publish all documents governing a company’s approved design practices either as a printed manual or as an online resource that is available to all users. A standards manual is an important resource for manufacturing companies that are transitioning to a new CAD system and provides a single resource for addressing and resolving user questions. The standards manual should include the following information.

Design and Engineering. This describes the company’s standards for engineering models and drawings. Should engineers use a specified company standard or ANSI standards? When working internationally, should the designers use European, British, or ISO standards? This information should address any questions related to how models and drawings are labeled, dimensioned, etc.

Data Exchange. This describes the company’s standards for exchanging data. Is there a preferred format for importing and exporting CAD data and for interacting with vendors, customers, or sup-pliers? Are there approved data exchange methods such as FTP, e-mail, compressed ZIP files, or web communication tools? Are there approved data healing approaches?

Design Communication and Collaboration. This describes the company’s standards for collabo-rating on and communicating design data. Are there certain design and life cycle management require-ments that come into play? How does a designer go about setting up a design review or requesting an engineering change? What are the design-for-manufacturing implications such as bending allowances, edge tolerances for punching, corner radius requirements, machining allowances, or CNC download requirements?

CAD-Related Configurations. This describes the standard configuration settings for both comput-er hardware and the CAD system. What display and pcomput-erformance settings should a designcomput-er use?

Should users keep the default settings or use company-approved settings for things such as file loca-tions, data backup, revisions, materials, part numbers, drawing numbers, and templates? Does the company have approved templates for drawings? Which fonts, line weights, arrowheads, and units should be used?

Design Practices/Methodologies. This describes methodologies for handling certain types of designs such as assemblies. Should engineers design assemblies from the top down to the compo-nent level or from the compocompo-nent level up? What are the standards for tolerances within assemblies?

Sketching. This describes the standards for creating engineering sketches. How will engineering sketches be used? What level of detail is required? Where should dimensions be located? What con-stitutes a fully defined sketch?

Part Modeling. This describes the standards for creating solid models of parts. How should designers handle models for purchased components? How should designers annotate the model?

How should designers prepare the model for interfacing with finite element analysis (FEA) pro-grams? How should engineers use part configurations?

Assembly Modeling. This describes the standards for creating assembly models. What structure should designers use for subassemblies? How should designers check for interferences within an assembly? How should designers apply annotations, notes, and datums to an assembly model? How should engineers use assembly configurations?

Drawings. This describes the standards for creating engineering drawings. What dimension styles should designers use? How should designers handle balloons and annotations? What drawing views are required? Why type of detail, projections, and sections need to be done? What external files should drawings reference?

Legacy Data. This describes the company policy on accessing and reusing legacy design data.

How can a designer access legacy data? What are the requirements for accessing legacy data? When can legacy data be used? How should legacy data be imported into the new CAD system?

General/Administrative. This describes the company policy for updating the CAD system. When should the CAD system be updated? What is the procedure for requesting an update? When should a designer develop custom programming for certain capabilities or macros for automating common repetitive tasks?

Education, Training, and Support. This describes the company policy for requesting additional training and technical support. Are there procedures for obtaining additional training? What are the support procedures? Are there internal support guidelines? Is there a procedure for accessing external support services?

9.7.2 Installation

The CAD implementation plan should address the information system needs of the new CAD system.

Computer Hardware. The plan should address the minimum system requirements for a user. What operating system (OS) is required? How much random access memory (RAM) does a user need?

What is the minimum CPU (computer processor) that will run the CAD software? What video cards and drivers does the CAD system support?

Printing Hardware. The plan should describe the printers, plotters, and peripherals that designers will use with the CAD system. Does the company need additional printing hardware to support the new CAD system?

Network Hardware and Topology. If the CAD system is used across a computer network, the plan should address any additional network hardware needs. Does new network hardware need to be acquired to support the new CAD system?

9.7.3 Training

The CAD implementation plan should address the level of training that each user should receive and schedule training in the least disruptive and most productive manner. In preparing the training plan, manufacturers should create a detailed training plan for each user.

• Essentials. Training that every user will need to operate the CAD system effectively.

• Advanced part modeling. Training that only users who are responsible for the design of unique parts will need to operate the CAD system effectively.

• Advanced assembly modeling. Training only for users who are responsible for the design of com-plex assemblies will be needed to operate the CAD system effectively.

• Specialized modeling. Training only for users who are responsible for specialized design func-tions, such as sheet-metal, plastic injection-molded parts, and piping systems, will be needed to operate the CAD system effectively.

• CAD productivity. Training in the use of CAD productivity tools such as utilities and feature-recognition software.

• Programming macro development. Training on how to leverage the CAD system’s application programming interface (API) to develop Visual Basic scripts, C++ coding, and macros for automating frequent tasks.

9.7.4 Legacy Data

The CAD implementation plan should address how the new CAD system will interface with legacy design data, whether 2D or 3D in nature, and establish procedures for how legacy data will be lever-aged, manlever-aged, and reused. What is the preferred design format for importing legacy data? How should it be saved?

9.7.5 Data Management

All CAD implementation plans should take product data management (PDM) needs into account.

The plan should include procedures on how designers will define, modify, revise, update, and archive CAD design data. Will this be done manually, or will the company use an integrated or standalone PDM system? If a new PDM system will be installed as part of the CAD implementation, are there additional training needs? Will the PDM implementation coincide with the CAD transition or take place later?

9.7.6 Evaluation

How can a product development organization determine whether the implementation of a CAD sys-tem has been successful? One way to evaluate a CAD syssys-tem’s success is to develop a methodology for comparing product development cycles and design costs against those experienced with the pre-vious CAD system. Have design cycles gotten shorter or longer? Have design costs gone up or down? Have a company’s scrap costs increased or decreased? Some CAD vendors provide method-ologies and surveys that are designed to calculate a customer’s return on investment (ROI), an indi-cation of the success or failure of a new CAD transition. When using vendor-supplied methodologies make sure that the items used for comparison are easily quantifiable. Building an evaluation com-ponent into a CAD implementation plan is important for gaining reliable feedback on whether the new CAD system is working.

9.7.7 Start with a Pilot Program

A particularly effective means of ensuring the successful implementation of a CAD system is to start small before going big. Designing and executing a pilot CAD implementation plan at the department or group level is an excellent way to gauge the probable impact and potential success of a CAD tran-sition across the entire product development organization. Simply develop the implementation plan for a single department or group, following the guidelines described above, and evaluate the results of that implementation as it applies to the larger organization as a whole.

Critical questions to ask include: Is the group more productive? Have costs gone down? Can the organization expect similar results company-wide?