Article by Sam Davis | Power Electronics
One in 10 design engineers still rely on purely physical prototypes, potentially adding significant, unnecessary costs to their designs, according to engineering surveys.
Many engineers rely solely on prototyping their designs to produce reliable and cost-effective products. However, some form of simulation along with prototyping can actually improve product designs. So it begs the question: “How should engineers decide on the optimum amount of prototyping and simulation?”
One in 10 design engineers still rely on purely physical prototypes, potentially adding significant, unnecessary costs to their designs. That’s according to research from 6SigmaET, which surveyed over 350 engineers working in industrial, consumer, and mass-produced electronics. One in 10 design engineers still rely on purely physical prototypes, potentially adding significant, unnecessary costs to their designs. That’s according to research from 6SigmaET, which surveyed over 350 engineers working in industrial, consumer, and mass-produced electronics.
Rather than running simulations to test their products, the new research highlights that many engineers (49%) produce multiple physical prototypes throughout the design process. This, of course, significantly adds to the end production cost of electronics products, components, and designs.
Additional findings from 6SigmaET’s research highlight that 40% of design engineers use simulation to reduce the number of physical prototypes, while 10% rely purely on simulation and don’t produce any physical prototypes, aiming for “right first time” when designing their products. It is essential to properly validate the design before manufacture to avoid poor-quality products, potential design issues like overheating and interference, as well as costly “back to the drawing board” product recalls.
Some industry experts were asked to share their opinions on prototyping and the role it plays in the design process. Here’s what they said:
Quote by Steve Sandler below:
“In most cases, and in all of our seminars and workshops, we teach that a measurement is a snapshot of a single instant in time. The measurement tells us about what “is” and not what “can be.” We use a combination of measurement and simulation in order to determine the sensitivities of operating characteristics and the impact of component and environmental tolerances to determine what “can be.”
“We also use the simulation models and measurements in concert to optimize the performance characteristics. In the typical case, we make measurements using an evaluation board or first-draft prototype PCB design to obtain the component data that the manufacturers didn’t provide or appeared to be suspect. These measurements then support the creation of a high-fidelity simulation model that is used for design optimization. This high-fidelity model and optimization result in a second, improved circuit and PCB design.”
Read the whole article with other engineer opinions here.
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