Design for Manufacture

The early design stage is very important in product design, most of the costs are committed at this stage. This is why good design for manufacture (DFM) is crucial.

What does it mean? Well, generally it means having a thought to what manufacturing processes may employed while working through the early design stages. Then designing accordingly. This could be; including draft angles or adding ribs in moulded parts or including radiused internal corners on milled parts.

The manufacturing process has an impact on the tolerances the parts can be made to and this in turn has an effect on the final parts or assembly. There are numerous considerations to be taken into account which all form part of the design engineers thought processes.

Any problems introduced at the design stage can have significant impact later on, which may involve costly and time-consuming redesign and modifications. We like to think we can take a project and run with it, avoiding any downstream problems. If we don’t have in house knowledge then we can call on one of our specialist associate companies to advise.

We always aim to deliver designs that we’re confident can be manufactured effectively.