Incorporating flexibility into system design : a novel framework and illustrated developments

Many complex engineering systems in general, and aerospace systems in particular, are highly ''optimized" designs, fielded to provide mission superiority or market competitive advantage. Two noticeable trends over the last few decades in engineering design have been increased optimization of the system architecture (mission-specific systems), and increased system design lifetime or service life. Unfortunately, many complex engineering systems often outlive the mission they were designed to address or the market they were designed to service (the mission being no longer relevant in the new environment or context, or in the case of a commercial system, the market has evolved beyond the need for that particular service). Because such complex engineering systems were initially highly optimized for that specific mission or market, they are often unable to modify their capabilities in order to address the new missions or markets that arise with time. In this thesis, we develop a framework that allows a system to be designed to maintain the competitive advantage despite environmental change. The resulting flexible system can refocus its core capabilities to meet new mission requirements. Within the context of this work, refocusing is achieved by exchanging key components needed for the old mission, for those needed in the new mission. A strategy to increase a system's flexibility was adapted from the art of platforming. A flexible system would enable the customer to exchange the obsolete components used for an old mission, for the components needed for a new mission (termed the frame), at a sufficiently low cost, and sufficiently short downtime.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2005

Author dc:creator

• Mark, Gregory T

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Joseph H. Saleh and Eric Feron.

• Aeronautics and Astronautics.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/30363

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/30363