An Engineer’s Guide to Design for Manufacturing (DFM)

What Does Design for Manufacturing Mean?

Design for manufacturing (DFM) is the efficient process of designing or engineering products during the early design stages when it is easier and less costly, purposely simplifying the manufacturing methods while reducing manufacturing costs and enhancing product quality. Design for manufacturing involves optimizing a product’s design to make manufacturing more straightforward and cost-effective. It allows early detection, quantification, and prevention of errors or inefficiencies throughout production, ensuring products are designed for efficient assembly.

Why Is Design for Manufacturing Important?

Design for manufacturability is core to the production cycle of any component and occurs in the early design stage, before the tooling and assembly process. It helps to ease manufacturing by reducing costs and making manufacturing less time-consuming. DFM optimizes product time-to-market and lowers production costs during the early design phases.

DFM is the right tool for any business to make profitable products since it provides the required speed efficiency, minimizes complexity, optimizes material selection, and increases output rates. Design for manufacturing offers final production cost-reduction and ensures the competitiveness of the manufactured products in the market.

Design for Manufacturing Principles

These principles guide the DFM process, optimizing product design for efficient production while maintaining quality standards. The five principles of design for manufacturing are as follows:

Process

The process comprises all physical manufacturing operations, such as CNC machining, electro-discharge machining, 3D printing, and others. Choosing the right manufacturing process based on the material, quantity, surface complexity, and preferred tolerances is critical to achieving the best results. The design for manufacturability experts are responsible for optimizing these processes to determine whether the selected method is right for the design.

For instance, manufacturing processes like 3D printing, injection molding, and CNC machining can be used to manufacture electronics enclosures. The DFM professional compares the pros and cons of each method based on the design and recommends the ideal one to the design and production teams.

Furthermore, each process has varying parameters. For instance, cutting speed, depth of cut, and feed are typical CNC machining parameters that can be optimized to achieve high productivity and quality.

Design

Often, certain unattended aspects of designs from a manufacturability perspective need to be addressed before the design is ready for production. Hence, engineers frequently identify potential issues and suggest solutions during DFM analysis. It helps to ensure that the product design aligns with good manufacturing principles for the chosen manufacturing process since the risks associated with more complex designs are often higher.

Hence, it is advisable to use a simple design in terms of manufacturing, cost, use, and maintenance. The design must specify more details, including tolerance, thickness, texture, and consistency specifications. For instance, DFM for CNC machining may include suggestions like adding fillets to sharp internal corners to accommodate the radius of cutting tools.

DFM experts can recommend significant design changes in certain conditions, necessitating collaborative work between both teams to devise the best solutions.

Materials

Picking suitable material for the product early in the product development stage can help save time and money. Your material choice significantly influences cost and quality since a wide variety of materials are available to produce different items.

For instance, manufacturers often use polymers, metals, composites, and plastics to manufacture enclosures. However, only one of these listed materials is perfect for this application. DFM analysis suggests the best-suited material by comparing each material against the final product’s functional requirement.

Conversely, a simple plastic enclosure will be the perfect choice if the enclosures are to be manufactured for low-cost electronics. Using an expensive material that is hard to manufacture metal would be over-engineering. Composite might be the ideal option if the enclosure is meant to protect an expensive, top-quality item from shock loads.  

More importantly, having a good chat with your manufacturing partner is essential because several factors affect your choice of materials. Thermal properties, flammability, mechanical properties, and conductance are typical properties that affect the selection of a material.

Environment

Each product must be designed according to its operating environment. Every operating condition must be considered to ensure proper product performance in these conditions. The working environment has characteristics like electric/magnetic interference, mechanical loads (dynamic and static), chemical exposure, humidity, and temperature.

The conceptual design may be unable to withstand the environmental conditions of the intended application. Hence, the DFM engineering team applies design for manufacturing principles to resolve the problems.

However, these solutions may include dimensional changes, such as additional wall thickness to accommodate mechanical loads. They can also recommend a different material based on its better thermal stability. In other situations, a specific surface coating may be added to the manufacturing process to safeguard the part from chemical exposure.

Compliance/Testing

All products must be thoroughly tested to ensure compliance with industry standards at each stage. These standards often range from industry to internal or company standards. DFM engineers must consider compliance with the part design and manufacturing process with such standards in all design stages.

How Is Design for Manufacturing Different from Design for Assembly

Design for manufacturing and design for assembly are two closely related concepts with varying purposes. In comparison, design for assembly focuses on designing and engineering a product to optimize its assembly and disassembly ease for maintenance and repairs. This approach aims to reduce the number of parts used in an assembly, ensuring easy insertion of the components of an assembly. Also, it limits assembly requirements and specifications to basic, repetitive motions.

Design for manufacturing addresses issues such as part complexity, material selection, and manufacturing tolerances, optimizing product designs for efficient and cost-effective manufacturing processes.

Benefits of Design for Manufacturing (DFM)

Implementing DFM into your product design process offers many long-term advantages. Here are some of the expected benefits of DFM:

• Improved Quality: Design for manufacturing aims to eliminate design features susceptible to manufacturing defects. DFM ensures higher product quality and reliability by simplifying design and reducing complex assembly steps.
• Enhanced Innovation: DFM promotes creative problem-solving during the product design process. The DFM approach provides innovative solutions that ultimately give a product the competitive edge it needs in the marketplace.
• Reduced Manufacturing Costs: DFM facilitates easy detection and removal of design features that increase machining costs. Most manufacturing companies can minimize production costs by optimizing the design for material use, production, and assembly.
• Competitive Advantage: DFM principles offer organizations a competitive edge that makes them stand out from other products in the marketplace. Hence, they can quickly provide inexpensive products with better quality and faster delivery times. As a result, this attribute attracts more customers and increases market share.
• Faster Time to Market: DFM aims to achieve shorter production lead times through streamlined and more efficient processes. This can help different companies get their products to market faster, an important factor in competitive industries.
• Reduced Waste: DFM minimizes scrap and waste during manufacturing by mitigating the likelihood of manufacturing errors and defects. As a result, DFM helps to ensure a cost-efficient and more sustainable production process.
• Higher Efficiency: Companies can easily achieve increased production efficiency by designing products for manufacturability. This includes better use of manufacturing equipment, reduced labor costs, and faster cycle times.
• Regulatory Compliance: With DFM, companies can ensure their products meet safety and regulatory standards early in the design phase. Hence, this reduces the risk of recalls or costly redesigns in the product lifecycle.

What Does It Take to Be a DFM Professional?

We have explored various aspects of design for manufacturing with much emphasis on the importance of DFM analysis and its principles. Here, we’ll briefly discuss the core skills required to be a DFM expert:

Collaborative Design

DFM’s approach includes collaborative efforts between designers, manufacturing specialists, and product developers. Modern companies encourage such teamwork through online and onsite collaborative design activities, often including learning to use innovative tools like cloud-based technologies and whiteboards.

Advanced Simulation and Modelling

Simulation and CAD modelling software are commonly used in DFM analysis. They allow manufacturing engineers to confirm whether the design can withstand operating conditions. They also help change the design according to the various manufacturing requirements.

Design for Manufacturing Practices in Different Industries

DFM principles apply to various manufacturing industries. Here are some of the common examples of DFM practices within various sectors:

Automotive

Automotive manufacturers embrace DFM principles in designing easy-to-access and replace engine components while ensuring reduced maintenance time and costs. Similarly, another DFM practice in the automotive industry includes using standardized fasteners and connectors to simplify assembly and reduce the need for customized parts.

Aerospace

Manufacturing engineers in the aviation industry rely on DFM to design aircraft components with tight tolerances to ensure reliability and precision. A common DFM practice in this field includes using lightweight materials with incredible strength, such as carbon fiber or composites to machine aircraft components to achieve fuel efficiency.

Consumer Goods

Designing enclosures for components with minimal undercuts for efficient molding in plastic injection molding is a typical DFM practice in the consumer goods industry. Snap-fits or clip-on mechanisms are employed for easy assembly of product parts.

Electronics Industry

Electrical and electronics industry manufacturers incorporate surface mounting technology (SMT) for components on printed circuit boards (PCBs) to simplify assembly. Another common DFM practice is designing PCB layouts with excellent thermal management to mitigate overheating.

Furniture

Common DFM practices in furniture manufacturing include using modular components that are easily assembled and disassembled to reduce shipping and warehousing costs. Likewise, designing furniture with less complex joints and fasteners for more efficient production is another common practice.

Medical Devices

DFM approach helps design medical devices with smooth, easily cleaned surfaces to meet hygiene requirements. More importantly, it allows medical professionals to achieve ergonomic designs for user-friendly and efficient operations.

Conclusion

Design for manufacturing is a strategic methodology in product development stages that focuses on improving the design process to improve manufacturing ease and efficiency. We have explored the fundamental principles of this engineering analysis, which will help you elevate your manufacturing projects. Contact AT Machining whenever you need help assessing the manufacturability of your product designs.

AT Machining is a top rapid prototyping expert with the best manufacturing solutions to help ensure your design ideas are ready before being sent to the factory floor. Our certified machinists, design engineers, and quality control teams have in-depth experience in CNC machining and other additive manufacturing techniques, such as 3D printing and injection molding. Contact us today, and let’s offer the professional assistance you need to get the best results from the Design for Manufacturing process. You can also submit your CAD files now for free and instant quotes!

FAQs about Design for Manufacturing

How Does DFM Impact Production Innovation and Efficiency?

DFM influences production innovation and efficiency by incorporating manufacturing considerations into the design process to identify and eliminate potential complications and constraints early. As such, it fosters innovation through more achievable designs. Through design for manufacturing optimizations, you can effectively streamline the production process and reduce costs to optimize efficiency.

Why Use Design for Manufacturing with 3D Printing?

Using design for manufacturing with a 3D printing approach offers numerous benefits. It allows rapid prototyping by enabling product designers to make quick design iterations and test them before mass production. Consequently, this fast-tracks the product development cycle and reduces time to market and costs associated with traditional prototyping processes.