Application of system design tools to integrative product development process

Although Magna (a fictional name for an automobile manufacturer) demonstrates year-on-year improvement across new and refreshed vehicle programs, they continue to lag behind the industry average within the category of "problems per 100 vehicles" as measured by J.D. Power and Associates' Initial Quality Survey (IQS). This project is concerned with the development of tools which can be used to improve the characteristics associated with complex system performance - considered a major factor in providing customers with high quality vehicles. The primary toolset leveraged for this effort was Datum Flow Chain (DFC) analysis which is useful for mapping out complex mechanical systems and identifying sources of potential improvement. This toolset also provides a practical means of generating standard design architectures which can be used to inform future product designs. Several technical and cultural barriers had to be addressed in order to clearly demonstrate the value of this new approach to improving customer satisfaction.

Department dc:contributor.department

Leaders for Manufacturing Program at MIT

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2005

Author dc:creator

• McFadden, Christopher David

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Daniel E. Whitney and Janice Klein.

• Sloan School of Management.
• Mechanical Engineering.
• Leaders for Manufacturing Program.

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/1721.1/34851

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/34851