Successful collaboration results in prestigious award

Set-based design is a paradigm for exploring, and keeping under consideration, several alternatives so that commitment to a single design can be delayed until limitations are known and requirements are settled. This ability can also support a circular economy based on the return of used or discarded components and systems to working conditions. 

“Set-based design is an appealing concept but can be hard to concretize. What we demonstrate in the paper is a novel decision support technique for a real industrial design problem that aid a typical design challenge in a Circular Economy setting. This makes it very interesting from a technical point of view,” says Ola Isaksson, co-author, and leader of the Systems Engineering Design group at the division of Product Development.

The authors propose a set-based design methodology to obtain scalable optimal solutions that can satisfy changing requirements through remanufacturing. The focus is on the use of additive manufacturing to realize its potential benefits. The methodology is demonstrated by means of a structural aeroengine component that is remanufactured by direct energy deposition of a stiffener to meet higher loading requirements.

 
Michael Kokkolaras (furthest to the right) is here seen receiving the Editors' Choice Award. In picture are also researchers from MIT who receveived honorable mentions, and Editor-in-Chief of the ASME Journal of Mechanical Design Professor Wei Chen.

The first and main author, Khalil Al Handawi, was a McGill PhD student under the supervision of Michael Kokkolaras, a McGill Mechanical Engineering Professor and Visiting Professor in Prof. Ola Isaksson’s group at Chalmers. Khalil spent three summers at Chalmers working closely with Prof. Isaksson and Dr. Panarotto as well as with Dr. Andersson of GKN Aerospace.

“The article is only one of several research outcomes of a very successful collaboration among Chalmers, McGill University, and GKN aerospace. We are very happy that this fruitful collaboration has been recognized by the prestigious ASME Journal of Mechanical Design,” says Ola Isaksson.

 

Khalil Al Handawi, Mechanical Engineering, McGill University

Petter Andersson, Multidisciplinary Design Optimization, GKN Aerospace Engine Systems; 

Massimo Panarotto, Industrial and Materials Science, Chalmers University of Technology
Ola Isaksson Professor, Industrial and Materials Science
Michael Kokkolaras Professor, Mechanical Engineering, McGill University

“Scalable Set-Based Design Optimization and Remanufacturing for Meeting Changing Requirements” was chosen in the category of design methods from among all 2021 JMD published papers as the winner of the Editors’ Choice Award. Only two papers were chosen in two categories, design methods and machine design, in 2021.

The selection of the awards was based on the recommendations of the Associate and Guest Editors and guided by the following criteria: (1) fundamental value of the contribution, (2) expectation of archival value (e.g., expected number of citations), (3) practical relevance to mechanical design, and (4) quality of presentation.