From Blueprint or Macdraw to CAD Configurations of a Design

摘要

With the increasing use of computers by designers, and the emphasis on case-based design approaches, the task of making use of (old) design drawings on-line becomes a bottleneck in the process of design automation. The fundamental problem here is how to describe contacts among solids to computers? We have developed an assembly planning system called KA3 which understands high-level symbolic specifications of contacts, static or articulated, between solids. KA3" takes Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG) descriptions of each individual part (solid) and contact specifications as general as solid A fits solid B or Solid B meshes with Solid C, then infers the specified configuration(s) automatically. Furthermore, KA3 checks whether the specified design can be assembled via one-step translations. Using KA3, users can interactively input a high-level description of a product in terms of parts and contacts (as read from a drawing) to produce a satisfied articulated CAD model.