Engineering Design Process – Product Development

Learn how to plan, design, and develop physical products following an approach used by German mechanical engineers

In this course, you will learn how to plan, develop, and maintain a physical product according to a systematic method without having to rely on elusive creativity or luck.

What you’ll learn

  • Methods for systematic product planning.
  • Gathering and validating product requirements.
  • Creating a solution-neutral product structure.
  • Developing a Product Concept.
  • Engineering the Product Embodiment according to common design rules.
  • Managing Engineering Change.

Course Content

  • Course Introduction –> 1 lecture • 1min.
  • Chapter 1 – Product Development Process –> 4 lectures • 15min.
  • Chapter 2 – Motivation –> 4 lectures • 11min.
  • Chapter 3 – Systematic Approach to Product Design –> 8 lectures • 34min.
  • Chapter 4.1 – Market Need and Product Planning –> 6 lectures • 19min.
  • Chapter 4.2 – Task Definition –> 10 lectures • 39min.
  • Chapter 4.3 – Creating Function Structure –> 12 lectures • 38min.
  • Chapter 4.3 – Drafting a Solution Concept –> 21 lectures • 1hr 11min.
  • Chapter 4.4 – Embodiment Design –> 20 lectures • 1hr 9min.
  • Chapter 4.5 – Detail Design and Product Documentation –> 4 lectures • 12min.
  • Chapter 4.6 – Product Lifecycle and Change Management –> 6 lectures • 13min.

Engineering Design Process - Product Development

Requirements

In this course, you will learn how to plan, develop, and maintain a physical product according to a systematic method without having to rely on elusive creativity or luck.

 

The content of this course is based on the German “Konstruktionslehre” (En. Theory of Design) – an engineering methodology established in the 1970s, taught at elite German technical universities and used by many organizations. The premise of this method is to give engineers or product designers the tools and resources to easily break down any technical problem and arrive at an optimal solution that fulfills the customer’s needs.

 

We will start by getting to know the scope and background of modern Product Development Processes, the current trends and challenges that impact the way we work. We will then learn why a systematic approach is best suited for tackling product development and introduce methods that form the basise of our technique.

Once this is covered, we will jump into the hands-on part of the course. It starts with gathering the product requirements, formulating its specs, and setting up a solution-neutral, graphical representation of our product’s functionality – the Function Structure. It serves as a basis for developing discrete engineering solutions for each functionality and combining them into a working Product Concept.

In the next step, we will learn how to transform the Concept into a final Product ready to be manufactured, applying rules for simple, clear, and safe design.

The last chapter will teach you how to recognize, trigger, and handle Engineering Change after the Product release to accommodate changing customers’ needs.

 

By the end of this course, you will be able to systematically develop your product idea and design it into a successful product without the risk of getting stuck or arriving at a sub-optimal result.

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