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Figure 1
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Team 74

Team Members

Faculty Advisor

Emma Finnerty
Ryan McAneany
Adam Velardi

Dr. Horea Ilies

Sponsor

PTA Plastics

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PTA Plastics is an injection molding solutions provider that is interested in providing accurate quotes to its potential customers through a web interface. The potential customers that request quotes for molds from PTA rarely have adequate manufacturing experience. Consequently, PTA must perform a design for manufacturability (DFM) analysis for the submitted designs prior to providing an accurate quote. The main objective of this project was to investigate the feasibility and options for automating the DFM analysis workflow required to provide these quotes through a web application. A second objective was to provide a proof of concept for development of the web application and supporting software. The team studied the injection molding process, as well as its manufacturability constraints imposed on the designs. The team’s efforts extended into how an application development engineer manually analyzes and critiques a given CAD model. This information was used to design the workflow of the web application. Subsequently, the team performed a comparison of the capabilities provided by several leading DFM software systems. The team proposed a proof of concept using API access of specific programs as one of the practical solutions that can address the needs of PTA Plastics. This option allows PTA Plastics to utilize existing, robust commercial software functionalities integrated with a web application. The team has also identified a second option involving the development and maintenance of a stand-alone DFM software, requiring in-house development. Finally, the team suggested the layout and functionality of the web application’s interface as a prototype developed through a web interface design tool. This prototype lays out the structure of the final web based automated DFM analysis and provides some interface suggestions.