1. DFMA® Design for Manufacture and Assembly from
Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc.
Welcome to an overview of DFMA - Design for Manufacture and Assembly - from Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc. This short presentation describes what DFMA provides and why this is important to your product development success.

2. Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc.
Founded in 1983 to provide Design for Manufacture and Assembly to industry.
Market leader in early design analysis tools for improving the product development process.
In the late 70’s, Dr. Geoffrey Boothroyd began the research supporting the pioneering analytic tool DFMA. This systematic approach to design review simplifies product structure and reduces manufacturing costs. Today, Dr. Boothroyd together with Dr. Peter Dewhurst (co-founder of Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc.), and their colleague Winston Knight are the leading international experts in the relation between design and manufacturing.
Boothroyd Dewhurst Inc.(BDI) was formed as the result of the development of the DFMA software in 1983 which allowed the methodology to be applied rapidly and efficiently. DFMA was quickly adopted in numerous industry settings, including the automobile, defense, high tech and medical fields.

3. National Medal of Technology
Geoffrey Boothroyd and Peter Dewhurst
For their concept, development and commercialization of Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DFMA), which has dramatically reduced costs, improved product quality and enhanced the competitiveness of major U.S. manufacturers.
Drs. Boothroyd and Dewhurst received the National Medal of Technology at a White House ceremony in The National Medal of Technology is the highest honor bestowed by the President of the United States to America's leading innovators. The Medal is given annually to individuals, teams, or companies for accomplishments in the innovation, development, commercialization, and management of technology, as evidenced by the establishment of new or significantly improved products, processes, or services.
The citation on their award reads:
For their concept, development and commercialization of Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DFMA), which has dramatically reduced costs, improved product quality and enhanced the competitiveness of major U.S. manufacturers.

4. Design for Manufacture
What is DFMA?
Design for Manufacture
and Assembly
Design Manufacture
DFMA is a systematic procedure for analyzing and quantifying a product design for its effect on assembly and manufacture. This procedure guides the designer to a simpler, more reliable and less expensive product. The number of parts and assembly operations are reduced, the selection of part production processes is optimized, and the resulting snowball effect on overheads can lead to dramatic cost reductions.
DFMA tools encourage dialogue between design and manufacturing and other disciplines that play a part in determining the final cost of a product. Team work is facilitated so that the benefits of concurrent engineering are realized.
The three main benefits achieved by applying Design for Manufacture and Assembly to the product development process are:
- reduce product cost
- speed time to market
and
- improve product quality
Encourages concurrent engineering
Builds team consensus
Systematic procedure
Quantifies assembly and manufacture during design
Reduce product cost
Speed time to market
Improve quality

5. DFMA - Reduce Product Cost
Design determines more than 70% of a product’s total cost
Studies have shown that over 70% of a product’s total cost is determined at the design stage.
Let’s listen to Dr. Peter Dewhurst on the importance of reducing costs during design.
Peter:
"Product designs which result from the application of DFMA can often be
described as elegant. It’s an elegance which results from using the full
advantages of manufacturing processes to reduce part count and at the same time to produce product structures which are efficient for assembly. The obvious benefits of this approach to the design are reduced material and processing costs. However, often the major advantage is the reduction of associated administration and overhead costs. Simpler products mean less purchasing, less receiving, less documentation, simpler planning, production, control, and distribution procedures. The list of benefits is almost endless."
Source: Ford

6. DFMA - Speed Time to Market
45% Savings 5%
25%
55%
15%
20% 5%
25%
55%
15%
20%
detail
changes
concept
data
Traditional process
DFMA reduces time to market by moving peak periods of problem resolution from the start of production to the design’s conceptual stage.
Here’s Dr. Geoffrey Boothroyd discussing the importance of early design decisions:
Geoff:
Designers are traditionally under pressure to produce results as quickly as possible and often perceive DFMA as yet another time delay. In fact, as case studies have shown, the overall design to manufacture cycle is reduced through using early manufacturing analysis tools, because teams can receive rapid feedback on the consequences of their design decisions where it counts -at the conceptual stage.
DFMA process

7. DFMA - Improve Quality Poor quality results from:
DFA Index “ease of assemblability”
Defects per million parts
Results of Motorola case study on product quality and DFMA.
Poor quality results from:
ommission errors
difficult assembly tasks
To achieve world-class quality it is not sufficient to just have high quality parts. Parts are likely to be left out of assemblies (omission errors), and difficult assembly tasks increase the likelihood of additional errors. Experience shows that if we are to achieve world class quality then a primary target must be a reduction in assembly mistakes.
A study at Motorola found that a strong correlation exists between the average assembly defect rate per operation and the average DFMA time estimate per operation. Case studies have shown that reductions in assembly times through DFMA results in considerable improvements in product quality.

8. DFMA Product Development Process
Concept Design
Design
For
Assembly
Design
For
Manufacture
Design
For
Manufacture
Design
For
Service
Environment
Design
For
Service
Environment
Let’s summarize the steps taken when using DFMA during design.
First, a Design for Assembly (DFA) analysis is performed to simplify the product structure and provide the quantitative data for design optimization.
Then, Design for Manufacture (DFM) is used to generate early cost estimates for both the original design and the new design in order to make trade-off decisions.
During this process the best materials and processes to be used for the various parts are considered. For example, would it be better to manufacture a part in the new design from sheet metal, or as an injection molding? Once materials and processes have been selected, a more thorough analysis for Design for Manufacture (DFM) can be carried out to obtain a total product cost.
Finally, service, maintenance, and end-of-life disposal costs can be evaluated using Design for Service (DFS) and Design for Environment (DFE).
Let us now look at a small sampling of how DFMA has been applied in industry.
Production

9. DFMA Implementation VIP 20 Microwave 29% part count reduction
26% assembly time reduction
VIP 20 Microwave
Project goals:
Teach DFMA to cross functional team
Facilitate communication
Whirlpool initiated a DFMA program with two main goals. One goal was to teach two cross-functional teams how to perform a DFMA analysis with the software. The DFMA software facilitated communication within the teams by providing “fact-based data” that was “easy for all members to understand and verify” according to a DFMA champion at Whirlpool. Another member of the team mentioned that having production engineers involved early in the design process allowed them, for the first time, to “eliminate assembly problems before the design is finalized.”
Because the European microwave market prefers simple, low-cost appliances, designs must be as lean as possible and assembly rapid and inexpensive. Thus, the second goal was to reduce in-plant costs and generate a lean design of a new microwave. The model that would be replaced with the new design, the VIP 20, was used as a benchmark.
The number of parts was reduced by 29%, and the assembly time was reduced by 26%. The new design also reduced tolerance buildup between various parts of the microwave, which will in the long run reduce wear and improve the quality of the product.

10. DFMA Implementation OptiFrame Chassis OptiFrame Chassis
DFMA is key company process for:
Improving throughput
Reducing costs
OptiFrame Chassis
32% assembly time reduction
44% service time reduction
As a fast growth company in a highly competitive market, Dell Computer Corporation sets high goals for improving throughput and quality while reducing costs. DFMA is at the heart of their process for achieving these goals.
DFMA software provided Dell with measurable results, and “proved invaluable in several respects” according to a user of the software. It was used as a product metric, “which not only allowed [concurrent engineering teams] to characterize the product performance at a level of detail that showed which specific components and operations needed attention, but it also provided a fair, objective and repeatable measure of improvement” – again according to a user.
On the OptiFrame chassis, product and process metrics met or exceeded all goals set. This included a 32% reduction in assembly time and a 44% reduction in average service time. With each new chassis design, Dell continues to make step function improvements in its products through the use of DFMA.

11. DFMA Implementation Longbow Apache
DFMA supports “lean design” initiative to increase competitiveness
Longbow Apache
Average improvements on three projects:
41% part count reduction
52% cost saving reduction
Companies within the aircraft industry constantly seek to increase their economic strength and become more competitive. The Boeing Company has adopted initiatives such as lean design to meet these challenges. Lean design is directly supported by DFMA according to a Boeing design engineer that has used DFMA extensively. He states, “DFMA has proven to be the right approach to attain substantial savings related to part, hardware, processes, and cycle time reduction as well as quality improvement.”
DFMA was used at Boeing in a redesign effort applied to the Longbow Apache AH-64D. According to a Boeing engineer, it’s important to realise however, that DFMA “can be used in any environment regardless of how complex the [product] is or how technologically advanced this environment may be.” With the help of DFMA, an average part count reduction of 41% and an average cost saving reduction of 52% were achieved on the Longbow Apache. Significant hardware, manufacturing, assembly/installation time, and weight reductions were also achieved.

12. DFMA Implementation Pick-up Truck Jump Seat Pick-up Truck Jump Seat
DFMA used to simplify product without sacrificing functionality
Pick-up Truck Jump Seat
35% part count reduction
93% assembly time reduction
Magna Interior Systems, a supplier of vehicle interior systems and seats, is faced with great pressure to reduce product costs. Contractual performance or productivity clauses often require annual downward price adjustments of 3-5% on products provided to the OEM. DFMA has been used by Magna “to enhance the outcomes of our Value Engineering Workshops, resulting in significant savings in materials, design costs, tooling , and processing of parts and assemblies,” as stated by a design engineer at Magna. This designer also holds that payoffs from implementing DFMA can be several times the cost of supporting the group using the approach.
DFMA was used at Magna to redesign, tool, and build a pick-up truck’s jump seat. A great challenge in itself, the OEM requested that Magna reduce part count without sacrificing functionality. However, the OEM also wanted tooling to begin within 6 weeks. These very tough goals were met. Specifically, part count was reduced by 35% and assembly time by 93%. One designer involved in this and many other DFMA projects states, “early analysis of new designs using the DFMA technique is crucial to the commercial success of each and every product.”

13. DFMA® Design for Manufacture and Assembly Reduce cost
Speed time to market
Improve quality
from
Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc.
The use of decision support tools which give quantitative predictions of the effects of design changes are indispensable in achieving the goals of
reducing product cost
speeding time to market
and
increasing product quality
With DFMA, you have the capability to achieve these goals.