Functional Tolerancing: A Design for Manufacturing Methodology

Abstract The problem addressed in this paper is the development of a physico-mathematical basis for mechanical tolerances. The lack of such a basis has fostered a decoupling of design (function) and manufacturing. The groundwork for a tolerancing methodology is laid by a model of profile errors, whose components are justified by physical reasoning and estimated using mathematical tools. The methodology is then presented as an evolutionary procedure. This procedure harnesses the various tools to analyze profiles in terms of a minimum set of profile parameters and to re-generate them from the parameters. This equips the designer with a rational means for estimating performance prior to manufacturing, hence integrating design and manufacturing. The utility of the functional tolerancing methodology is demonstrated with performance simulations of a lathe-head-stock design, focusing on gear transmission with synthesized errors.