This paper on "Progress in Manufacturing Simulations" was presented at the NAFEMS World Congress on Effective Engineering Analysis - 25-28 April 1999, Newport, Rhode Island, USA.

Abstract

Manufacturing simulation has made significant progress in the past two decades. This has been motivated by societies requirements to obtain higher quality parts at reduced costs. Manufacturing processes require sophisticated analysis because of the materials used and the complex contact boundary conditions. Recent improvements in numerical procedures to obtain efficient accurate solutions to these problems will be highlighted. These methods will then be applied to some typical manufacturing problems.
Significant progress in the numerical simulation of manufacturing processes has been made in the past twenty years. This work has resulted in improved quality of finished products with a reduction in the cost of manufacturing. The manufacturing process is a complex endeavor covering areas as diverse as material handling, shaping of material, finishing, assembly, and packaging to name a few. Computer simulation has been applied to all of these processes from inventory control systems, to numerical control to kinematics modeling to finite element simulation.