A multicriteria decision-aid system for joining process selection

In this paper the authors present a comprehensive approach to select joining processes at early product design stage. Information on 54 standard joining processes widely used in electromechanical assembly was gathered. This information was used to build a database of properties, divided into 5 categories: materials, production, process, geometry and joint properties. Criteria for the joining of components were defined in order to describe the requirements of a problem at early design stage. The main originality of this work is the application of a multicriteria decision-aid method called PROMETHEE to the joining process selection: eligible solutions are ranked according to a global evaluation of their performance for the considered parameters. Industrial case studies which validate the approach are presented