Feedback evaluation of assembly plans

The authors examine issues involved in integrating the design level and the assembly planning level with a feedback loop. The integration is performed in two stages. The first stage focuses on the evaluation of an assembly plan. Evaluation criteria that can pinpoint areas which need redesign are defined. The second stage is to use the evaluation results to come up with the actual redesign. Algorithms are developed for performing evaluation of assembly plans. From the evaluation results, means of generating hints for redesign are discussed. The hints are then processed and calls are made to the redesign operators to perform the actual redesign of components. The integrated design-planning system has the ability to identify parts that need redesign and the ability to come up with feasible redesign options in polynomial time