Study And Application Of Generative Product Form Design Using Genetic Algorithm

Product design is a problem-solving activity. To obtain an optimal solution, designers usually use systematic methods to deal with problems including data collection, analysis, synthesis and decision-making. During the design process, designers need to collect and process variety of information related to the design, use a series of approaches and amount of knowledge to acquire feasible schemes. It is an important research area of product form design to enhance the design efficiency and to improve the design quality.In order to enhance the efficiency and the extent of knowledge integration in the design process, a product form design approach based on genetic algorithm (GA) is proposed with considering the characteristics of GA.The relevant works both from domestic and overseas in this domain have been discussed and under its guidance, the potential application domain and model of GA in computer aided industrial design (CAID) are also proposed in the thesis.The formation of initialization population of the product form and the implement method of GA are discussed respectively. The framework for the product form design system based on GA has been constructed. Function models of the system are divided, and the differences between the product form design method based on GA and traditional methods are also analyzed.The hierarchy of tree structure has been used to divide the function components of the product and support GA's encoding process. The realization method of the product form design system based on GA is explained. One-pointcrossover, simple mutation and optimal conservation strategy have been chosen to perform the searching process. Based on the product's function decomposition, the hierarchy of structural feature data and the GA's encoding method of product are devised. The GA's operators are also designed according to the encoding method.Because the aesthetic elements in the form design are difficult to be evaluated by ordinary methods, an evaluating system based on QFD and AHP is proposed to deal with this problem. The individual's synthesizing fitness is obtained through analyzed the product's characteristics, the customer's needs, the expertise's opinions and the rival products' characteristics. A questionnaire based on the customer's needs is proposed as well.Based on the system structure and the GA's mechanism proposed in the thesis, the GA components based on COM are developed by using MFC and Visual C++, and Visual Basic is used to developed the system's interfaces, finally, the product form design software system based on GA are built up by using SolidWorks2003 API and put it into use of an upper panel of mobile telephone form design process.