Research Article

Decision Support System for the Design of Multi-

Spindle Drilling Housing
Ayoub Fajraoui1, Kamel Mehdi2
Abstract
Expert systems can be defined as computer programs, whose main task is to simulate a human expert,
usually in a narrow of expertise. In this study, an intelligent design system approach has been
developed to integrate various phases of the mechanical design process including fuzzy logic and
neural network (artificial intelligence methods). The Expert system assists with the design, analysis,
calculation and library module of the design of two stages and above gearbox with helical gears. Using
the presented Expert System reduces the time during the design and production preparation process.
Keywords: Computer aided design, Design methodology, Expert system, Kappa Pc, Mechanical
design, Multi-spindle gearbox Object-oriented language

Introduction
The design process of the mechanical products is tedious and time- consuming because of various stages and
complex activities involved. On the other hand, there is strong pressure to reduce overall costs in a competitive
market environment.1 But, the traditional design approach is inadequate in meeting these needs. Today a lot of
mechanical design application software and different database are used for mechanical design studies, but these
technologies are distributed and there is not coordination between these. Therefore, a number of researches have
focused their studies on establishing a cooperative and integrated environment. For industrial application, there is a
soft-ware called Phoenix model center which is a software solution that enables users to create model-based
engineering frameworks to many mechanical design software in the same time. 2 Su and Wakelam studied on an
intelligent hybrid system for integration in design and manufacturing. Their approach blends a rule-based system,
artificial neural networks, genetic algorithm, hypermedia and CAD package into a single environment. 3 Expert
system is capable of computational, qualitative, descriptive and explanatory functions.

An additional advantage of expert system is the ease of use, in a process which boils down to a series of questions
and answer between the computer pro-gram and the user, in which the system receives relevant information, not
only from the user but also from external sources of knowledge, such as spreadsheets, and other calculation tools. 4
Some applications: Conventional heat-transfer fluids such as water, mineral oil, and ethylene glycol play an
important role in many industrial sectors including pulp and paper, petrochemical, chemical, food, textile and other
processing plants. However, these fluids are inadequate for some applications which need high-heat-flux such as
superfast computing, superconducting magnets, novel supersonic jet aircraft, and high-power microwave tubes due
to their low thermal conductivity.

1Mechanical Engineer/Ph.D Student, Mechanical Department, National School of Engineers of Tunis (ENIT), El Manar University,
Tunis, Tunisia.
2Associate Professor Faculty, Preparatory Institute for Engineering Studies El Manar (IPEIMa), University of Tunis EL Manar

(UTM), El Manar University, Tunis, Tunisia.

Correspondence: Mr. Ayoub Fajraoui, Mechanical Department, National School of Engineers of Tunis (ENIT), El Manar
University, Tunis, Tunisia.

E-mail Id: ayoub.fajraoui@enit.utm.tn

Orcid Id: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7240-5427

How to cite this article: Fajraoui A, Mehdi K. Decision Support System for the Design of Multi-Spindle Drilling Housing. J Adv Res
Auto Tech Transp Sys 2017; 4: 11-16.

© ADR Journals 2017. All Rights Reserved.

Fajraoui A et al.
Methodology
Expert System as Decision Support System Tool
Advisory system is an expert system that provides ad-
vice to a user.5 This Expert system will provide the
advices and assists for solving problems that are
normally solved by human experts. According to
Aronson and Turban, both advisory systems and expert
systems are problems-solving packages that
Figure 1.Knowledge Base
Structure and Description of the Presented
Expert System
The inspiration to create such a system is the fact that
expert systems have a great deal of opportunities for
implementation into manufacturing such as drilling.
The presented expert system displays knowledge of
these following subjects:
• Input and output data
• Piece Materials and gears
• Drilling diameter and coordinates
• Elementary gear sprocket
Figure 2.Task Analysis
J. Adv. Res. Auto. Tech. Transp. Sys. 2017; 2(3&4)
mimic a human expert in a special area.6 These systems
are constructed by eliciting knowledge from human
experts and coding it into a form that can be used by a
computer in the evaluation of alternative solutions to
problems within that domain of expertise. On the other
hand, Gregg and Walesa were stated that advisory
systems are designed to support decision making in
more unstructured situations which have no single
correct answer.7
In general, a mechanical system is each set of objects
belonging to a family objects. These objects are linked
together to form groups, subassemblies and finally all
final. Each family of objects can be structured in several
subfamilies. The set of all family’s objects as well as a
library of objects made and in the development of such
a library, several aspects must be considered. In the
basic knowledge of this system, different criteria are in
the form of production rules of the form “if history then
conclusions” The “history” of the rule is the level of
importance of criterion and the ‘Conclusions’ lists
bearings meet the level of importance of the criteria
considered. This list may possibly be empty. Figure 3
shows an example of some rules.8
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J. Adv. Res. Auto. Tech. Transp. Sys. 2017; 2(3&4)
Implementation of the Expert System SADCBPM
In this study, the design of four-stage gearbox with
helical gear has been chosen as a design case study to
illustrate and test the developed system for the
complete design and analysis of the gearbox. This
Figure 3.Four Stage Gearbox
Gear Design
The first phase consists on the one hand, seized by the
program user preliminary characteristics of the different
gears.
For the choice of the piece of material to be drilled, the
expert system has the ability to have a database for all
possible materials.
Furthermore, this step is the acquisition of the
corresponding cutting parameters to the tool and
Figure 4.Grade Selection of Materials for Drilling
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Fajraoui A et al.
gearboxes designed for a wide drilling mass production
part and win the order cycle times and optimize
production Muda by this drilling multipin housing was to
minimize recourse. That’s why the design using this
expert system will greatly facilitate the validation this
case.
the material to be drilled (Fig. 6). These operations are
carried out through an interactive man-machine interface.
Note that in our approach, the gears are designed by the
same type of material, the same pressure angle and the
same helix angle. However, these Wheels can have
different cutting modules. The values of these modules will
be imposed by the specifications. For the parameters of
cutting the calculation module
consist to choose depending cutting speed of the formula N =
(1000*V )
rpm
c and for the choice of the feed rate
π*D
according to the equipment used.
Fajraoui A et al. J. Adv. Res. Auto. Tech. Transp. Sys. 2017; 2(3&4)

Figure 5.Cutting Parameters

Moreover, the creation of the drill entities (Fig. 7) is the
second phase. This operation is also carried out through an
interactive man-machine interface. Note that a hole is
previously defined by its unique identifier, its diameter and
its coordinates (x, y). In addition, each hole created by the
user will be displayed in a screen window. Meanwhile, the
system automatically associates the drilling creates an
instance “gear” type “spindle gears.” Thus, thanks to the
dynamic link between the defined attributes of an object
and its methods, the program calculates the power
needed for cutting and the frequency of rotation at
each drill spindle. This calculation is made based on the
values entered by the program user. The calculated
values are then automatically transmitted to the pinion
pin with a simple message sent by the system.
Therefore, the pin gears instances associated to the bores
created by the user instances form for the initial facts
system for the creation of a kinematic chain. These facts
then represent the basic facts of the expert system.

Figure 6.Data Entry and Creation of Drilling Bodies

Methods, Rules and Functions in Expert System Methods are functions written in the object- oriented
SADBPM language within an object class (Fig. 10). They perform
treatments such as:
For our expert system rules are classified into three
groups: General, classification and diagnosis. The first • Send messages to other objects
engine triggers the general rules and those for the • Run predefined functions of KAL
grading and finally those relating to diagnosis (Fig. 9).

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J. Adv. Res. Auto. Tech. Transp. Sys. 2017; 2(3&4) Fajraoui A et al.

Figure 7.KAPPA-PC Interface

Figure 8.Rule Grouping Written in Kappa-PC and Function Forward Chaining

Results and Analysis
Once all drilling object instances are created the program
supports chaining rules step through the inference engine.
This step, in three phases, the automatic creation of
elementary reducing drilling, automatic creation of
elementary reducing transmission to finally lead to the
creation of the entire drive train housing. The system
uses the “forward chaining” in its reasoning mechanism.
Since the creation of computer programming phases of
the last two types of gear is not yet complete, we will
limit our-selves in what follows the presentation of the
implementation procedure for the drill gearboxes.

Figure 10.Impact Summary Interface

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Fajraoui A et al.
Conclusions
The expert system shell developed is user friendly, and
it does not require the user to have any programming
knowledge to use it. The system can help young and
inexperienced engineers in their decision making. In
addition, such systems are less costly to use and saves
time. Having chosen the Kappa-Pc because of the
possibility of using the rules and object classes, the goal
of our work is now grouped into objects and object
classes everything that is related to the de-sign task
kinematic chains of boxes of multi-spindle drilling.
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