The future of wire harness design to manufacture
The future of wire harness design to manufacture
Keywords: Harness Software, Aircraft, Software, Electrical wires,Harnesses
As aircraft become increasingly sophisticated, so the wiring needed to power and control their electrical systems also becomes increasingly complex. While the manufacture of other elements of an aircraft has been subject to considerable automation, the production of the electrical wire harness - because of its complexity and large number of variations - remains a highly labour-intensive process. About 50 per cent or more of the cost of a harness can be accounted for by labour and, as harnesses become more complex, so the data management task becomes more unwieldy. A helicopter, for example, may contain 20,000 wires up to 30km or more in total length. It is not surprising, then,that designing and making these harnesses is a highly complex task and that the need to simplify the design and engineering process is becoming ever more important to maintain competitive edge.
Typically, some of the influences affecting the harness development process are:
Tight product development lead times derived from competitive pressures.
Support of multi-partner projects split between different companies in different countries.
The need to focus business processes on core activities and remove"non-value added" processes, especially duplication of data entry.
Support of a "right-first-time" approach to design and engineering.
Reduction of the number of physical prototypes through increased use of the digital mock-up concept.
Until now, little attention has been given to applying computer technology and systems thinking in the harness design and engineering process and integrating that into the design and manufacture of the finished product. The new generation of CAD/CAE tools however, offers the possibility to minimise duplication of effort, optimise data sharing and provide a full digital mock-up and manufacturing environment for wire harness engineering. This concept can be best visualised in Figure 1.
Figure 1 Wire harness design to manufacture
Data from computer-aided logical and physical designs can be imported into a single harness database which contains components, harness definition, labour time and costs, and material prices. This database brings together data from all departments, allowing for the first time the effective sharing of data even where designers and engineers are in different countries. Automatic checking eliminates cumbersome manual processes and allows quick identification of errors, which can be rectified before they find their way into the finished product. Immediate recognition of new or unknown parts allows early identification of potential sourcing problems for critical components, again helping to avoid last minute corrective action.
Validated harness designs can be easily interchanged electronically between multiple project partners, as well as their wire harness sub-contract manufacturers. Project status and controlled design changes can be transferred promptly, ensuring data consistency and product quality.
Harness Software is a leading provider of software solutions to the wire harness industry. Its Desktop Harness design product allows the 3D routeing of a harness in a solid model and its conversion into a 2D harness layout, with bills of materials and a nominal wire cut list. Harness Software's Capital FP provides the heart of the process - the Harness Database - and allows detailed engineering of even the most complex harness. Its outputs include reports covering automatic harness checking, which allows immediate identification of errors in the harness, even before the first prototype has been built. It also produces bills of materials, splice charts, true wire cut lists, costing and production of the manufacturing Form Board Drawing. Harness Software solutions can manage electrical wire harness projects in a wide variety of aerospace products from aeroplanes and helicopters to satellite systems and ancillary equipment such as engines and avionics systems.
Further details are available from Harness Software Ltd. Tel: +44 (0) 161 718 7788; E-mail: gillian.tomaselli@harness-software.com; Website: http://www.hamess-software.com
John Judkins is Technical Director of Harness Software Ltd, UK. Co-founder of Harness Software, he has led product development from the beginning and has operated as the Technical Adviser to several companies implementing the latest harness engineering concepts.
