SIMILAR ASSEMBLY-MODEL STRUCTURE SEARCH SYSTEM AND SIMILAR ASSEMBLY-MODEL STRUCTURE SEARCH METHOD

摘要

The purpose of the invention is to provide a technology for efficiently extracting a sub-assembly similar to a newly designed sub-assembly from among sub-assemblies designed in the past. A database stores information on assembly models generated by a 3D CAD, and a region of an assembly to be retrieved is also input as a 3D assembly model. The feature values of the parts constituting a sub-assembly to be retrieved, the similarities of the shapes of the parts, and the degrees of partial matching in how the parts are related to each other are determined to extract a similar sub-assembly from the entire assembly model. A search method is employed in which parts for which shape similarities are to be checked and parts for which shape similarities are not to be checked are mixed and similarities in how those parts are related to each other are to be checked. With this method, the entire assembly model is searched for a sub-assembly similar to a given sub-assembly. In addition, assembly structure search is conducted even if the configuration of the constituting parts does not completely match but is partially different, and the degree of matching is shown quantitatively.