Tolerance analysis for assembly planning

The specification of tolerances is an integral part of product design since tolerance directly affects the functionality, manufacturability, and cost-effectiveness of the product. However, it is not clear whether the given tolerance specification will allow assembling the product successfully. Therefore, the tolerance analysis can play an importance role in assembly planning. Assembly planners in the past have assumed nominal dimensions for product components for generating the feasible assembly sequences, but some sequences may not be assemble in practice due to the possible propagation of tolerances producing a large misalignment, making it impossible for subassemblies to assemble. In this paper, the authors present a preliminary research work on a new approach to a tolerance analysis concerning mainly the propagation of tolerances and clearances, and the assemblability analysis of subassemblies. The approach is based on the worst case analysis using the maximum tolerance and minimum clearance