Manufacturing Engineering
Manufacturing engineering effectively connects great product design and the manufacturing processes used to produce the designs. Simplexity Product Development’s approach to manufacturing engineering starts at the beginning of the project when the architecture is being developed. Every step of the way, Simplexity engineers consider the manufacturing options best suited to the engineering requirements and design the product accordingly.
Simplexity’s manufacturing engineering team will ultimately select an appropriate production manufacturing process, such as injection molding, formed sheet metal, machining, casting, and even 3D printing, for every physical part in the design, informed by projected production volumes.
What Is Manufacturing Engineering?
Simplexity’s Manufacturing Engineering expertise includes:
- Manufacturing process selection
- Process optimization
- Manufacturing and assembly vendor development
- Product simplification and cost reduction
- Streamlined production
- Product quality monitoring
Manufacturing Readiness
Manufacturing engineering, in conjunction with product design, follows the product lifecycle through production and shipment. Ensuring manufacturing readiness is an integral part of Simplexity’s manufacturing engineering scope.
Simplexity’s manufacturing readiness tasks commonly include:
- Tooling vendor selection support - With an extensive network of tooling vendors, Simplexity can onboard tooling vendors with competencies based on product design and cost requirements.
- Contract Manufacturer selection and onboarding - helping to select the right contract manufacturer to ensure smooth handoffs from design to manufacturing.
- Process flow and assembly documentation developed during early engineering builds - for training and seamless handoff to contract manufacturers.
- Ongoing product verification testing to confirm product meets requirements.
- Assembly fixture and QC tool design and development and implementation to ensure product quality metrics are met while on the manufacturing line.
- Manufacturing and assembly process validation to support final assembly at the contract manufacturer.
- Quality metrics monitoring to evaluate yields, trends, and problem areas.
- Onsite contract manufacturing supervision to ensure training, production quality, and test protocols are maintained and to confirm the processes used will achieve the quality requirements to ensure high part quality throughout the build, until the finished product reaches the hands of the end customers.
- Cut-no-corners quality measures to ensure optimal end products: acceptable material substitutions, localization considerations, resource development, and other ways to improve overall product quality for your manufacturing engineering process.
Simplexity offers full-service product design and engineering, New Product Introduction (NPI), project management, and production and manufacturing engineering to meet and exceed your most stringent requirements.
Manufacturing Engineering and Production Volumes
Simplexity’s approach to manufacturing engineering is to select the most cost-effective manufacturing process for the product that meets the requirements. In selecting a manufacturing process, one critical factor to consider is the product’s projected volume. Certain processes like injection molding have an up-front tooling cost that may not pay back in part cost savings for very low volumes.
Even for a projected high-volume product, it is often impractical to invest in tooling during the early stages of development when the potential for significant design change is still high. In this case, prototype parts made with a different process need to be evaluated, considering the likely differences in material properties.
With the advances in both 3D printing equipment and material, it is now possible to get short-run parts with structural properties suitable for end-use products. Simplexity engineers have been working with leaders in 3D printing to enable us to take advantage of the most recent developments for our clients.
Proven, Practical Product Design and Manufacturing Engineering
Simplexity’s engineering case studies include successful manufacturing engineering projects. We realize that even the best prototypes don’t guarantee successful product production without a solid manufacturing plan in place. Simplexity approaches manufacturing as an advocate for the client’s interests, not the contract manufacturers’. With weekly project status reports focused on manufacturing engineering and manufacturing process requirements, Simplexity welcomes full collaboration between your staff and our manufacturing engineering team throughout the development process.
What’s more, Simplexity’s New Product Introduction (NPI) process aligns perfectly with three key components of effective, useful manufacturing engineering: product cost management, product quality optimization, and reduced time to market. Finding the right manufacturing process is closer than you think, thanks to Simplexity’s complete line of engineering and project management services.
Contact Simplexity and enjoy production and manufacturing engineering optimization as part of the design of your product. We look forward to hearing from you!
“Simplexity has become our go-to group for engineering projects large and small. With funding always critical and timelines crucial, their quality solutions come in on time and within budget. We’ve been pleased on numerous occasions with how they maintain our product manufacturability goals while implementing our complex requests.”
-Vince Guffey
Production and Quality Manager, Medvantx
Software: Design Complete
Hardware: Pre-production units for design verification
MFG. Readiness: CM schedule and budget, Unit build tracking