Design, implementation and use of a knowledge acquisition tool for sheet metal forming

Knowledge Management systems utilising a number of different techniques have been developed for manufacturing processes including sheet metal forming. These are designed to overcome knowledge loss and allow an organisation to more effectively leverage its corporate experience base. Most systems focus on design activities only, they do not capture and integrate the experience gained on the shop floor during testing and production. In order to be used in these areas, knowledge capture must be as simple and time efficient as possible, even if this is at the expense of later potential reasoning. The design, implementation and results from the use of a knowledge acquisition system of this kind for the automotive stamping industry are described. Despite perceived conceptions of data captured, it is concluded that underlying relationships can be extracted from the information entered, allowing significant reuse of captured experience, whilst maintaining timely knowledge acquisition.