Utilising latent benefits of substructures in computer aided design and optimisation of complex vehicle assemblies

Collaborative information technologies and tools are successfully used in computer aided design providing numerous benefits, such as better productivity and reduced time and cost to their users. However, availability and usage of such tools amongst fine element (FE) analysts has been relatively poor because of the inability to save or reuse computational time and effort taken during a FE analysis. This paper presents an innovative methodology that utilises substructures to enable collaboration for FE analysis in vehice design. The methodology is proposed and an extended example involving the design and optimisation of a car seat adjuster mechanism assembly is presented to highlight feasability of the methodology and showcase flexability and adaptability of the methodology.