Early Stage Digital Twins for Early Stage Engineering Design

DS 94: Proceedings of the Design Society: 22nd International Conference on Engineering Design (ICED19)

Year: 2019
Editor: Wartzack, Sandro; Schleich, Benjamin; Gon
Author: Jones, David Edward; Snider, Chris; Kent, Lee; Hicks, Ben
Series: ICED
Institution: University of Bristol
Section: Knowledge-based engineering
DOI number: https://doi.org/10.1017/dsi.2019.262
ISSN: 2220-4342

Abstract

While extensive modelling - both physical and virtual - is imperative to develop right-first-time products, the parallel use of virtual and physical models gives rise to two interrelated issues: the lack of revision control for physical prototypes; and the need for designers to manually inspect, measure, and interpret modifications to either virtual or physical models, for subsequent update of the other. The Digital Twin paradigm addresses similar problems later in the product life-cycle, and while these digital twins, or the "twinning" process, have shown significant value, there is little work to date on their implementation in the earlier design stages. With large prospective benefits in increased product understanding, performance, and reduced design cycle time and cost, this paper explores the concept of using the Digital Twin in early design, including an introduction to digital twinning, examination of opportunities for and challenges of their implementation, a presentation of the structure of Early Stage Twins, and evaluation via two implementation cases.

Keywords: Design engineering, Design informatics, Design management, Early design phases, New product development

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