Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21

Cost-effective design for injection molding

Yuh-Min Chen*, Jang-Jong Liu
Institute of Manufacturing Engineering, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan 70101, ROC
Received 8 December 1997; received in revised form 23 October 1998; accepted 13 November 1998

Abstract

It is commonly agreed that a large proportion of the ultimate product cost is determined at product design stage. Therefore, a cost-
effective design cannot be obtained unless all cost issues are resolved at early design stage. Therefore, instead of performing cost
estimation after design, research presented in this paper aims to provide on-line cost evaluation and advisory to help product
designers avoid cost-ineffective design. The objective can be obtained by (1) identifying factors that might affect product cost at each
product design stage, (2) developing a design for cost effectiveness methodology that accommodates the concepts of concurrent
engineering, and (3) developing a computer-based design for cost effectiveness system based on the proposed methodology. In this
research, we focus on injection molding product design due to the advantages of injection molding process, such as high production
rates, excellent quality and accuracy of the parts, and very long mold life. This paper first reviews and characterizes the conventional
molding product development process with an emphasis on the identification of cost factors. Based on the results of process
characterization, a cost model is developed, which depicts the relationships between cost factors and product development activities,
as well as their relationships with product geometry. According to the product life cycle activities and the cost model, a design for cost
effectiveness process is proposed. The process and the cost model are then employed for the development of a computer-based product
design for cost effectiveness as one of the module of an integrated design for injection molding environment.  1999 Elsevier Science
Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Concurrent engineering; Design for cost effectiveness; Computer-aided design (CAD)

1. Introduction measures to prevent manufacturing problems and signifi-

Concurrent engineering has been considered one of the
key concepts that enable companies to improve product
competitiveness by incorporating product life cycle
values into the early stages of design. These values relate
the entire product life cycle from conceptual design
through manufacturing to disposal, including product
functionality, cost, manufacturability, assemblability,
serviceability, and even recycleability.
However, it is not easy for a designer to identify a de-
sign that is functionally acceptable, producible and cost
effective at the design stage because it involves a multi-
tude of design and manufacturing knowledge. One of the
possible resolutions is the employment of design for
manufacturing (DFM) and design for assembly (DFA)
tools that help incorporate into the early product design
* Corresponding author. Tel.: 886-6-2757575 ext. 63922; Fax: 886-
6-2085334; E-mail: ymchen@mail.ncku.edu.tw
cantly simplify the production process [1—10].
It is commonly agreed that a large proportion of the
ultimate product cost is determined at the design stage.
Therefore, many research efforts have been conducted on
developing methodologies and systems for product cost
estimation [11—14]. However, most of these efforts con-
duct cost estimations after the completion of product
design. Major redesigns are often required in order to
meet cost limits and thus extend the design process. It is
even impossible to make changes on the original design
due to the difficulties in resolving the conflicts between
cost and other design concerns.
Instead of performing the cost estimation after design,
the design for cost effectiveness research conducted in
the Concurrent Engineering Research Laboratory of
National Cheng Kung University deals with identifying
factors that might affect product cost at each product
design stage. The focus of this research is two-fold:
(1) development of a design for cost effectiveness meth-
odology that accommodates the concepts of concurrent
engineering and (2) development of a computer-based

0736-5845/99/$ — see front matter  1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S0736-5845(99)00005-8
2 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
design for cost effectiveness system based on the pro-
posed methodology.
Design for cost effectiveness is concerned with the
factors that affect the cost of a component, such as
material cost, tooling cost, manufacturing method, cost
of tolerance and surface finishes for the selected manufac-
turing method. Since most of the factors are related to the
components geometric characteristics, the identification,
definition and representation of product geometric char-
acteristics that are cost sensitive is one of the challenges
in this research. To characterize the relationship between
product geometry and cost variation is the other.
Design for cost effectiveness is a highly skill- and
experience-intensive activity. It can be seen as a process
consisting of a series of tasks that transforms a non-
economically producible part geometry into an economi-
cally producible one. To fully analyze and model such
a complex activity, activity or process analysis and
modeling techniques are required. Meanwhile, how to
redesign the conventional product design process to
adapt the concepts of design for cost effectiveness is
the issue to address after activity analysis and charac-
terization.
To support design for cost effectiveness, a computer-
based system is necessary. How to obtain, represent, and
incorporate the knowledge for a cost-sensitivity evalu-
ation into the computer-based framework is another
issue.
This paper first reviews the conventional molding
product development process with an emphasis on the
identification of cost factors. Based on the results of this
process characterization, a cost model is developed,
which depicts the relationships between cost factors and
product development activities, as well as their relation-
ships with product geometry.
According to the product life cycle activities and the
cost model, a design for cost effectiveness process is
proposed. The process and the cost model are then em-
ployed for the development of a computer-based product
design for cost effectiveness module as the sub-system of
an integrated design for an injection molding system.
2. Molding product design characterization
and cost analysis
This section begins with a characterization of the
conventional injection molding product design and
its relationships with other development activities. The
purpose is to fully understand the characteristics of the
injection molding product development process so as to
facilitate molding product cost analysis. Following the
design characterization, a cost analysis is performed with
the outcome of a cost structure consisting of dominant
cost elements and their relationships.
2.1. Molding product design characterization
Injection molding product design includes conceptual
design, preliminary design, parting lines/planes design,
and detail design [15]. In conceptual design, a sketch or
a conceptual model is configured based on the products
functional requirements. Preliminary design deals with
the construction of the initial product geometry and
specifications of additional performance requirements.
The preliminary product geometry consists of features
that meet the products functional requirements and their
relationships, among other things. After creation of the
initial product geometry, additional performance
requirements are specified in the form of geometric
constraints and engineering relationships. Detail design
refines the preliminary product geometry into a shape
that is functionally acceptable and compatible with the
injection molding process.
Product design is also affected by the results of other
injection mold product and process development activ-
ities. Process design determines molding process
parameters such as clamping force, heating temperature,
compression force and injection speed. The results of
process design determine manufacturing cycle time and
the overall manufacturing maintenance and support
costs, which in turn affect the cost of the product. In
addition, material fillability is considered to avoid
molding defects in process design, which affects the
product quality and depends heavily on the geometric
characteristics of the product and the results of mold
design.
Mold design involves shrinkage design, cavity and
core layout, parting line determination, feed system de-
sign, cooling system design, ejector design, and venting
design. Material fillability, mold producibility, and mold
fabrication costs are the concerns of mold design. Mold
cavity layout, feed system design and cooling system
design affect the fillability of molding material which in
turn influences the moldability and quality of the prod-
uct. Besides material fillability, mold manufacturability
also determines the producibility of the product.
Mold fabrication process planning determines the
detailed methods by which molds can be manufactured.
It therefore affects the mold cost and consequently the
product cost.
In summary, the concerns of molding product design
include product functionality, producibility, quality, and
cost, each of which is related to the results of other
development activities as shown in Fig. 1.
2.2. Molding product cost analysis
Generally speaking, product costs are influenced by
the number of parts being produced, the material being
processed, tooling costs, process cycle times, and the
amount of scrap generated.
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
Fig. 1. Classification of product design concerns.
In this paper, we focus on the variations in product
cost through the process of product design. Therefore,
instead of considering all related cost factors, we empha-
size those factors which directly affect the cost of indi-
vidual products. Basically, the key components of the
cost of a product are material cost, processing cost, and
tooling cost [15—17]. Material cost can be computed
using the weight of the part multiplied by the cost of
a unit weight of material including an allowance for
material waste. The cost of allowance for material waste
in molding typically include tare costs, scrap costs, and
in-plant processing costs. The ‘‘tare’’ material must be
remelted before it can be reused for other mold products.
The tare costs are associated with spures, biscuits, run-
ners and overflows because they are non sellable. Scrap
includes warm-up shots, in-plant rejects, and returned
parts. Handling, fuel, equipment utilization, flux, laborat-
ory overhead, and volumetric loss costs are incurred as
a result of the recycling process. The in-plant processing
costs should reflect the furnace charge and energy costs.
The processing cost per molding is obtained from
adding the primary processing cost, the post-processing
costs, and the plant overhead costs. The major dominant
cost items for the primary processing costs are machine
rate per unit time and direct labor rate per unit time. The
machine rate is usually dependent on the machine capa-
city. For labor rate, a typical number of operators per
machine and a wage rate can be applied. Cycle time and
production yield rate are important cost parameters. The
actual production yield is the percentage of salable mold-
ings which is the total product minus moldings that will
eventually be scrapped divided by the total number.
3
Trimming and machining are typical post-processes con-
siderations in molding. The trimming process requires an
additional trimming press if manual trimming is not
used. The machining operations in molding are used to
achieve specific features such as undercuts, or side holds.
The processing cycle time usually consists of solidifi-
cation time, the machine opening and closing time, and
the manual motion time. They are available in the ma-
chine database. However, the cycle time is controlled to
a lesser extent by factors such as geometry and type of
material. For example, the time required for a material to
solidify usually depends on the most massive feature of
the part. The press opening and closing events also re-
quire additional time when more complex moving mem-
bers, such as core slides and staged core retractors, are
employed. The processing cost per part can be obtained
using the machine rate and cycle time for processing the
part. The machine rate is determined by the cost of the
machine and the method of machine amortization. The
cost of the injection molding machine can be identified
from the equipment data base. The labor rate is largely
influenced by the degree of the machine automation and
labor required. It is usually possible to have one operator
tend more than one machine. There may also be situ-
ations where two operators are assigned to one machine.
The tooling cost includes mold cost and auxiliary
tooling cost. The initial price of a mold is obtained from
adding the cost of the mold base, the mold manufactur-
ing costs, mold construction costs. These costs are asso-
ciated with many cost factors. For example, the cost of
mold manufacturing and construction are strongly
coupled with the number of cavities, part size, and
4 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21

tolerances. The cost of the mold base depends on factors
such as molding material, part size, and the number of
cavities. Among these factors, a major cost factor for
a mold is its size. A larger mold needs more material,
more machining operations on its external surface and
holes. The ejector plate and pins are also larger and
heavier. Another predominant factor on the cost of
molds is part shape attributes such as features and shape
complexity. Auxiliary tooling includes tooling for trim-
ming, core handling, and fixturing.
The cost structure of moldings is illustrated in Fig. 2.
The relationships between the cost components can be
represented in a mathematical format. The following
shows part of the relationships:
2.3. Multi-level cost evaluation model
To support cost-effective design servel, levels of cost
information which evolve with the design process are
required. Instead of producing accurate cost estimation,
the proposed cost evaluation model aims to support cost
evaluation during design by providing rough cost estima-
tion and cost sensitivity.
The multilevel cost evaluation model was developed
by combining the cost structure and the molding product
design process. In this model, levels of cost components
are selectively used at various design stages according
to the available product information. The model, as
illustrated in Fig. 3, is a two-dimensional hierarchical

Product cost (Pc)"material cost (Cm)#tooling cost (Ct)#processing cost (Cp),

Material cost (Cm)"net material cost (Cnm)#loss and handling cost (Clh),
Net material cost (Cnm)"(volume/part) * (lb/volume) * ($/lb)"($/part),
Loss and handling cost (Clh)"tare cost (Ctar)#scrap cost (Cscr)#in-plant processing cost (Cinp),
Tare cost (Ctar)"tare rate (Rtar) * part weight (PW) * recycling cost (Crcy)"% * (lb/part) * ($/lb)"($/part),
Scrap cost (Cscr)"(1#tare rate (Rtar)) * scrape rate (Rscr) * part weight (PW) * recycling cost (Crcy)
"(1#%) * (lb/part) * ($/lb)"($/part),
In-plant processing cost (Cinp)"(furnace hourly rate (Rfur)#energy cost per unit time, (Cene))
* in-plant processing time (Tinp)"($/sec#$/sec) * (sec/part)"($/part),

Tooling cost (Ct)"mold cost (Cmc)#auxiliary tooling cost (Cau)

Mold cost (Cmc)"Nmold * ((mold base cost (Cmbc)#mold machining cost (Cmmc)
#mold construction cost (Cmcc))/total production quantity (TPQ)
#mold setup cost (Cmsc)/lot size (Lsiz)
"(mold) * ($/mold#$/mold# $/mold) * (1/part)#($/setup) * (setup/part)"($/part),
Auxiliary tooling cost (Cau)"trimming cost (Ctri)#subsidiary tooling cost (Csub),
Trimming cost (Ctri)"Nmold * ((mold base trimming cost (Cmbtc)#mold trimming machining cost (Cmtc)
#mold trimming construction cost (Ctcc))/total production quantity (TPQ)
#mold trimming setup cost (Ctsc)/lot size (Lsiz),
Subsidiary tooling cost (Csub)"cost of cores (Ccor)#cost of fixture (Cfix),

Processing cost (Cp)"primary processing cost (Cpp)#trimming process cost (Ctr)

#secondary processing cost (Cse)#plant setup cost (Cst),
Primary processing cost (Cpp)"number of cavities (Ncav) * (directly labor hourly rate (Cdil)
#machine hourly rate (Rmac)#utility cost (Cutl))
* cycle time (Tcyc)/yield rate per machine (Ryie)
#machine setup cost (Cmse)/lot size (Lsiz)
"($/sec#$/sec#$/sec) * (sec/part)#($/setup) * (setup/part)"($/part),
Secondary processing cost (Cse)"cost of machining (Cmc)#cost of impregnation (Cic)
#cost of surface treatment (Cstc).
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
Fig. 2. The cost structure of molding products.
structure with levels of design tasks and levels of domi-
nant cost factors for each design task. Each task owns
operation characters that consist of one or several shape
characteristics which correspond to a cost component.
For example, the task of feature design creates part
features that own the characteristics of size, tolerances
and shape complexities, which influence the part size,
mold cavity feature tolerances, and mold cavity feature
complexities, respectively. They in turn drive the material
cost, auxiliary tooling cost and mold cost. The cost
components are broken down into detailed levels of
dominant subcomponents as illustrated in Fig. 3. At the
higher levels, general cost components such as material
cost, processing cost, and tooling cost are involved, and
at the lower levels more detailed cost items such as tool
maintenance cost, machine setup cost, and machine cycle
time are included.
It is important to know that the information available
for the cost evaluation is different from design stage to
design stage according to the availability of product
geometry information. In other words, the cost items
which can be estimated from the available data depend
upon the design status. Therefore, this cost model aims
to reflect the relationships between the levels of geo-
metric characteristics of levels of decision makings of
design process and different levels of available cost in-
formation.
5
3. Analysis of shape characteristics and product cost
This section analyzes the relationships between shape
geometric characteristics and product cost based on the
cost model developed in the previous section. Since fea-
tures are the key elements of a product, the features are
seen as cost units and used as the center for shape
characteristics analysis. The results of shape character-
istic analysis is then used for analyzing the relationships
between shape characteristics and product cost.
3.1. Features as the cost units
Part size and part shape complexity are the main
factors affecting material cost and tooling cost which in
turn dominate the product cost. Shape complexity is
directly related to equipment operating cost. For in-
stance, for moldings of modest size and complexity, mold
impressions for edging, blocking, as well as finishing are
commonly included in a single mold set. However, for
larger moldings and moldings of intricate design, two or
more sets of molds may be required to perform the
necessary operations on available equipment. Manufac-
turing costs are also significantly dependent on the geo-
metrical features of the product. For instance, designs
with relatively thin walls or small radii usually lead to
additional mold costs in the injection molding process.
6 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21

Fig. 3. Cost evaluation model.

Additional tooling time is almost always necessary and,
in extreme cases, extra steps in the manufacturing process
must be contemplated.
According to the concept of feature-based design,
a part is constructed, edited, and manipulated in terms of
features with certain spatial and functional relationships.
Therefore, the size and the shape complexity of a part is
largely dependent on the size and shape complexities of
features in the part and their spatial relationships. In
other words, the size and complexity of a part varies with
the adding, placement and editing of features along the
design process. In order to evaluate the variations in
product cost over design process, we define features as
‘‘cost units’’ and view the cost of a product as the ag-
gregation of the ‘‘cost units’’ of its forming features and
their interactions. Hence, there is a need to analyze and
model how feature shape characteristics affect product
cost. To facilitate this analysis, three tasks are performed:
feature classification, feature structure analysis, and fea-
ture interaction analysis.
(1) Feature classification: To facilitate shape charac-
teristic analysis, features are classified into pre-defined
features and user-defined features. Each of the classes
includes primary features and secondary features. The
former are used to form the major shape of a part and
the latter are shapes attached to or subtracted from the
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
major shape of the part. The secondary features include
positive features and negative features. If feature A is
obtained by subtracting primitive A from primitive
B which forms feature B, feature A is a negative feature
and feature B is a positive feature, else both feature A and
feature B are positive features. Placing a positive feature
will add material to a part, while placing a negative
feature will remove material from a part and thus form
a cavity in a part.
(2) Feature structure: A feature is composed of one or
more primitives which can be positive or negative.
A primitive is created by extruding, blending, revolving
or sweeping a profile along a trajectory. A positive primi-
tive is created with a ‘‘protrusion’’ function, while a nega-
tive primitive is created by a ‘‘cut’’ or ‘‘shell’’ functions.
Each of the protrusion and cut functions includes op-
erations such as extrusion, revolution, sweeping,
and blending. The structure of features contains levels
of feature information, including the feature itself,
forming primitives, the profile, trajectory and operation
of each primitive, and the geometric dimensions of the
primitives.
(3) Feature interactions: In feature-based design,
a product is the aggregation of a set of features and
Fig. 4. Feature mapping.
7
feature relationships. Each feature relationship is
associated with two features. A feature relationship can
be ‘‘Is—In’’, ‘‘Is—On’’, or ‘‘Adjacent—To’’ according
to the spatial or functional relationships between the
features.
The Is—In relationship indicates a spatial relationship
in which a negative feature is inside a positive feature.
Functionally, the existence of the negative feature is de-
pendent upon that of the positive feature. And, very
often, some of the geometric parameters of the negative
feature are dependent upon those of the positive feature.
The Is—On relationship defines two adjacent positive or
negative features with certain functional or geometrical
dependencies. In contrast to the Is—On relationship, the
Adjecent—To relationship defines two adjacent positive
or negative features without any functional or geometri-
cal dependencies.
(4) Feature mapping: The purpose of feature mapping
is to convert a part feature into a mold cavity feature to
support mold-related cost evaluations. Figure 4 illus-
trates the mapping between part features and mold cavity
features. A protrusion feature becomes two depression
features in the main cavity, if it is split by parting surfaces;
otherwise, it maps into a depression feature. A depression
8 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
feature maps into one protrusion feature and two
depression features if it is not split by parting surfaces.
On the other hand, the mapping results depend upon the
location of the parting surface, if it is split by parting
surfaces. Since a parting surface perpendicular to the
section plane of the feature will cause an undercut, an
insert may be required. The mapping result in this case is
two depression features and an insert. On the contrary,
the mapping result will be two depression features if the
parting surface is parallel to the section plane of the
feature. A secondary feature maps into one or two com-
plementary secondary feature(s) depending on whether it
is split by the parting surface or not.
3.2. Shape characteristics and product cost relationship
analysis
As mentioned before, instead of estimating the entire
product cost, we focus on the variations in cost in-
fluenced by the changes in the product geometry, which
are made by the design tasks. This section hence aims to
analyze the relationships between product cost and part
shape characteristics formed at each design stage. Ac-
cording to the proposed design framework, the part
shape characteristics may be formed by (1) the shape
characteristics of forming features at feature design,
(2) the interactions of the forming features after feature
placement, and (3) the splitting of features at parting line
design.
3.2.1. Feature design
According to the analysis of the feature structure in the
previous section, a part feature is defined in terms of its
form profile and trajectory. The complexity of a feature is
therefore directly affected by its profile and trajectory,
which in turn influence the processing time and cost. The
number of profile types is innumerable; while the trajec-
tories can be limited to classes of straight lines, arcs, and
curves based on the feature creation operations. There-
fore, the relative processing time and relative process cost
can be identified for various types of profiles.
As shown in Fig. 5, the part feature shape character-
istics are classified into extruding straight lines revolving
arcs, sweeping curves, parallel blending straight line,
rotational blending arcs, and general blending curves.
The material fillability of a feature created by extruding
a profile along a straight line is better than a feature
created by revolving the profile along an arc, which is in
turn better than a feature created by rotational blending
along an arc, and so on. Similarly, the relative processing
costs for the classes of features can be obtained as shown
in Fig. 5.
The fabrication costs of mold cavity features are deter-
mined by the manufacturing methods selected and the
manufacturing time, which are both influenced by the
shape complexities of the mold cavity features. Since
mold cavity features are formed from the shapes of corre-
sponding part features, the shape characteristics of mold
cavity features can be defined and classified as in the part
features. Also as shown in Fig. 5, the shape complexities
of a mold cavity feature can be obtained from its corre-
sponding part feature using feature mapping and can be
also classified into classes of extruding straight lines,
revolving arcs, sweeping curves, parallel blending
straight lines, rotational blending arcs, and general
blending curves. In this example, milling and EDM are
considered for mold cavity feature fabrication. The
manufacturing time and manufacturing cost are propor-
tionally increased as feature trajectory complexity in-
creases.
3.2.2. Feature placement
The product cost varies after each placement of fea-
tures because the product shape characteristics are
changed due to feature interactions. Similar to feature
design, the cost influenced by feature placement includes
injection molding processing cost and tooling cost. Pro-
cessing cost includes labor cost and machine cost. The
machine cost can be reduced by reducing machine cycle
time and using suitable machines. The machine cycle
time itself can be reduced by proper mold design. For
example, heavy mass areas will take a longer time for
cooling, hence cooling time can be reduced by eliminat-
ing massive features mold set-up time and opening/clos-
ing time can be reduced by avoiding the use of slides and
stage core retractions, and reducing moving members.
Tooling cost is determined by mold fabrication cost,
mold maintenance cost and mold life. Some of the prin-
ciples which reduce tooling costs are reducing the num-
ber of mold components, avoiding sharp corners, adding
proper drafting, simplifying parting lines, avoiding
narrow/long/deep protrusions or depression features,
and avoiding complicated surfaces.
Due to shape complexity, to assess whether a feature
placement is cost effective is much more difficult than to
identify if there is any area that will potentially increase
the product costs after feature placement. Therefore, at
this stage, instead of characterizing the relationships be-
tween shape characteristics and relative cost, we focus on
the identification of shape characteristics that may cause
cost ineffectiveness.
The shape characteristics that might cause cost ineffec-
tiveness include massive feature intersections (Fig. 6a),
thin walls (Fig. 6b), rapid global wall thickness changes
(Fig. 6c), heavy mass areas (Fig. 6d), and the significant
dimensions of individual features (Fig. 6e). Most of these
shape characteristics can be identified by significant
items, such as ‘‘thickness’’, ‘‘depth’’, or ‘‘distance’’ formed
by feature interactions. The thickness can be a stack up
thickness (type I thickness), a thickness created by
placing a negative feature in a positive feature (type II
feature), or a thickness between two coplanar negative
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21 9

Fig. 5. Feature characteristics and product cost.

features (type III thickness) (see Fig. 7). The typical
‘‘depth’’ found in feature interactions is the stack up
depth in between two adjacent negative features. Most of
the ‘‘distances’’ exist in between two coplanar positive
features. However, the thickness in between two coplanar
negative features can be also seen as the ‘‘distance’’ be-
tween these two features.
As shown in Fig. 8, the shape characteristics discussed
above can be classified into the groups of Is—In, Adjac-
ent—To, and Intersect based on the types of feature inter-
actions. These part feature interactions will map to the
interactions of mold cavity features also as illustrated in
Fig. 8. Similar to the relative manufacturing cost of a part
feature, the relative fabrication cost of a mold cavity
feature interaction is dependent on the shape complexity
of the interaction, which can be derived from the com-
position of the shapes of its component features.
3.2.3. Surface finish and tolerance specification
Precision tolerances drive the need for expensive capi-
tal equipment, tooling, training, maintenance and may
require costly inspection systems. There is a simple rule
for cost evaluation at this stage. That is precision toleran-
ces are more costly than tolerances requiring a lesser
degree of precision.
3.2.4. Parting line specification
There are three cases that may cause cost changes after
parting line specification. One involves a parting line that
10 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
Fig. 6(a). An example of feature intersection. (b) Examples of local wall
thickness. (c) Examples of global wall thickness change. (d) Examples
of global wall thickness change. (e) Examples of significant items.
splits negative cavity features and increases feature shape
complexity and consequently increases mold fabrication
costs. The second involves the need for using a core or
insert to avoid undercuts. The fabrication cost of a core
or insert depends on the shape complexity, which can be
derived using the same method used in feature shape
characteristics analysis. Drafting, filleting and rounding
Fig. 7. Types of thickness.
are required to improve part ejectability after the deter-
mination of parting lines and mold opening direction.
A draft is a slight angle placed on surfaces to allow the
surface to move away from the mold cavity wall without
sticking to the mold as it opens. Drafts facilitates molding
opening and thus reduce processing time. However,
drafts may slightly increase mold manufacturing diffi-
culty and consequently increase mold fabrication costs.
A round is required for a convex edge while a fillet is
required for a concave edge. The radius for the corner or
fillet is based on the material used, the geometry of the
edge and the length of the edge. Basically, fillets and
rounds are used to smoothen the material flow and to
some extent facilitate mold opening. Adding fillets and
rounds will thus reduce processing time and cost. How-
ever, since the shapes of fillets and rounds are more
complicated than planner faces, the mold fabrication cost
may be slightly increased.
4. Computer-aided design for cost effectiveness
This section presents a proposed procedure for com-
puter-aided design for cost effectiveness as shown in
Fig. 9. It includes the steps of feature design, preliminary
design, parting line design, detail design and the related
evaluations at each design step.
Besides feature-based design methodology, the prin-
ciples behind the proposed procedure include: concur-
rent design, interactive design evaluation, and iterative
redesign. The basic idea of concurrent design is that
product life cycle issues are considered and reviewed at
the early design stages. The concept of concurrent engin-
eering is implemented by evaluating molding product
design against product life cycle concerns at each design
stage.
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
Fig. 8. Part shape characteristics formed by feature placement.
Design for injection molding can be seen as a
constraint satisfaction problem, which involves the con-
tinuous evolution of the product model through the
recognition, formulation and satisfaction of constraints
that represent the conflicting requirements of perfor-
mance, reliability, quality, durability, producibility, and
cost effectiveness. One of the approaches of this proced-
ure is to provide a design advisory during the design to
ensure that all product life cycle concerns are satisfied.
Instead of fully automating the design and redesign, an
interactive design evaluation and iterative redesign ap-
proach is employed. That is, the product design is per-
formed as an iterative ‘‘design, design evaluation, and
redesign’’ process. The product designer is responsible for
the initial design decision making and the design advis-
ory system is interactively evaluating the decision for
concern satisfaction. If any conflicts occur, a redesign is
suggested and the designer is responsible for the redesign.
11
The iteration continues until no further conflict or the
designer accepts the result.
4.1. Feature design
The objective of feature design is to design a feature
that is functionally acceptable, as well as producible and
cost effective. This begins with the selection of a feature
from a feature library and followed by a series of evalu-
ations for producibility, cost effectiveness, and mold fea-
ture manufacturability. Feature design includes the tasks
of feature creation, feature selection, and feature evalu-
ation. Both feature creation and feature selection are
conducted by the designer, while feature evaluation is
performed by the computer-based system automatically.
(1) Feature creation: Features in the feature library
include pre-defined features and user-defined features.
Most of the pre-defined features are common injection
12 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21

Fig. 9. The proposed procedure for injection molding product design for cost effectiveness.

molding features, such as bosses, ribs, holes, webs,
cored-holes, drafts, rounds, fillets and grooves. To facilit-
ate product geometry creation, some commonly used
primitives such as plates, discs, blocks, cones, cylinders,
slots and cutouts are also pre-defined in the feature
library. However, to support wider applications, de-
signers are allowed to create user-defined features
through the following steps: (1) parametric original shape
creation, (2) variable dimension specification, (3) dimen-
sion type specification, (4) origin, orientation and axis
specification, and feature definition [18].
(2) Feature selection: Feature selection is conducted by
performing the following steps: (i) Specify instance data
— the designer is first requested to enter the instance data
for the variable dimensions. This will generate the orig-
inal shape of the feature on the screen. (ii) Define the
relationships among dimensions — the relationships
among dimensions in the feature can be constrained in
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
terms of equations. (iii) Specify feature size tolerance
— the size tolerance of each dimension in the feature can
be defined by giving its plus and minus deviations. Right
after feature selection, a model of the selected feature is
created to support producibility evaluation, cost effec-
tiveness evaluation, and mold producibility evaluation.
(3) Feature evaluation: Evaluations on features
include: producibility evaluation, cost effectiveness evalu-
ation, and mold feature manufacturability evaluation.
The cost effectiveness evaluation at this stage is conduc-
ted only on material costs and tooling costs because it is
not easy to estimate the processing cost on a single part
feature. In the material cost evaluation, the cost to in-
crease or reduce by adding the feature is estimated and
recorded in the feature model. The value will be retrieved
and compared with a new value if any redesign on the
feature occurs. Basically, adding negative features will
reduce material costs; on the contrary, adding positive
features will increase material costs. Mold costs, at this
stage, are mainly the cost for fabricating the mold cavity
features mapped from part features.
4.3. Preliminary design
In the preliminary design, the feature placement is first
conducted by the user, which is followed by evaluations
on the interactions between the placed feature and other
existing features. The evaluation focuses on the impact
caused by the interactions on product producibility, cost
effectiveness, and mold manufacturability.
4.3.1. Feature placement
The feature placement starts with the placement of
a base feature. The base feature is placed in a world
coordinate system which is formed by three datum planes
perpendicular to each other. The other features can then
be placed relative to the base feature or other existing
features. Two approaches are employed for feature place-
ment [18]. In the first approach, the designer is required
to specify a placement face, reference edges, faces, or
datum planes, location parameters as well as a placement
orientation. In the second approach, an axis or a coordi-
nate system is associated with each feature for feature
placement. The placement is defined in terms of a trans-
formation between the axis of the child feature and that
of its parent feature.
4.3.2. Feature interaction evaluation
The feature interaction evaluation includes a produci-
bility evaluation, cost effectiveness evaluation and mold
manufacturability evaluation as discussed below.
(1) Producibility evaluation. Feature interactions occur
between the newly placed feature and all other existing
features. The significant items such as stack-up depth,
maximum wall thickness, minimum wall thickness,
13
stack-up height, minimum distance, and maximum dis-
tance, which are formed due to feature interactions and
will potentially cause defects are identified by geometric
reasoning according to type of interaction discussed in
Section 3.
(2) Cost effectiveness evaluation. Instead of estimating
the cost precisely, the cost effectiveness evaluation at this
stage intents to provide a rough product cost and the rate
of cost change per placement to help designers avoid high
cost designs and maintain cost effectiveness. Therefore,
the identification of product geometry characteristics and
mold geometry characteristics that may cause a change
in net material cost, and mold feature fabrication and
mold maintenance costs is performed based on the types
of interactions discussed in Section 3.
(3) Mold manufacturability evaluation. The mold
manufacturability evaluation aims to check if there is any
mold manufacturing difficulty caused by the placement
of a part feature. The evaluation concentrates on the
interactions of mold cavity features, which can be identi-
fied from the part feature interactions as discussed in
Section 3.
4.3.3. Overall shape evaluation
An overall shape evaluation is performed on the entire
product shape after preliminary design. It involves deter-
mining the compatibility of the material with the process,
checking part size, weight and dimensions to prevent
conflict with alloy limitation, checking global significant
items such as global wall thickness, global depths, and
global distance, to provide smooth material flow to avoid
excess voids or porosity.
4.4. Finish and tolerance specification
Tolerances and functional attributes such as material,
surface finish can be specified after preliminary design.
Tolerances include geometric tolerances, size tolerances,
location tolerances, and form tolerance, each of which
can be specified in various ways as discussed in [18];
functional attributes are mainly specified on the bound-
ary faces of features or the part.
Since the precision and tolerance of molding products
are produced by molds, a producibility and cost effec-
tiveness evaluation are performed on the mold surface
finishes and tolerances propagated from those specified
in the part. A part surface finish or tolerance is achievable
if there exists mold fabrication machines, operations and
tools with capability of the specified precision level.
Hence, producibility evaluation at this stage is conducted
as machine selection, operation selection and tool selec-
tion. It is a general principle that high precision surfaces
and unnecessary tight tolerances should be avoided to
ensure producibility and cost effectiveness.
14 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
4.5. Parting line design
Parting line design includes the steps of parting line
specification, undercut detection, mold cavity manufac-
turability, and cost effectiveness evaluations.
(1) Parting line specification: Parting lines or planes
can be specified in two ways. The first is to draw parting
lines onto the faces of the part and to split the faces along
the parting lines. After splitting, the faces will be grouped
into two groups for later manipulation. In this case, the
user is required to define the mold opening direction on
the basis of any of the faces. The other is to add a tag to
any plane picked as part of the parting planes. The
designer is also required to define the mold opening
direction. This is done by attaching a tag onto the plane
picked from the parting planes as the index for mold
opening direction. The mold opening direction is defined
as the opposite direction of the normal vector of the
plane of the plane picked. The opposite direction is
necessary because the mold usually opens away from the
parting plane.
(2) Ejectability evaluation: The ejectability evaluation
involves checking if any face may cause an undercut
according to the parting lines specified in the previous
step. Once an undercut is detected, the designer may add
features, such as cores or slides to remove the undercuts,
delete the feature that contains the faces forming an
undercut, or re-specify the parting planes.
(3) Mold cavity manufacturability evaluation: The
evaluation is performed on the mold cavity features that
are split by the parting lines to ensure their manufactura-
bility. Models of the split mold cavity features are ob-
tained by mapping the split part features.
(4) Cost effectiveness evaluation: The cost effectiveness
evaluation at this stage rates the changes in mold fabrica-
tion and processing costs per parting line specification.
Cost comparisons are made in between ‘‘before’’ and
‘‘after’’ parting line specifications’’ as well as in between
‘‘before’’ and ‘‘after’’ parting line modifications.
4.6. Detail design
Once the parting line and mold opening direction have
been determined, the draft design and round and fillet
design are performed to improve part ejectability.
(1) Draft design. The draft design consists of several
steps supported by a draft design evaluation function and
cost evaluation. They are draft face detection, draft addi-
tion, draft amount evaluation, and dimension modifica-
tion. Face requiring drafts are identified and the amount
of draft is determined based on the material used and the
wall depth of the face requiring draft. Since drafts facilit-
ates molding opening and thus reduce processing time,
cost evaluation on draft design focuses on the increment
of mold fabrication cost by checking if there is any
additional operation is required for producing the draft.
(2) Fillet and round design. The steps of fillet and
round design include corner identification, fillet or
round addition, fillet or round radius evaluation, dimen-
sion modification, and cost evaluation. Corner identi-
fication is to determine where a fillet or round is required
and what is the proper amount of radius. Similar to that
in draft design, fillets and rounds are used to smoothen
the material flow and to some extent facilitate mold
opening, adding fillets and rounds will reduce process-
ing time and cost. Therefore, cost evaluation in fillet
and round design focuses on the increment al mold
fabrication costs by checking the increment al shape
complexity.
5. System development
This section presents the development of the com-
puter-aided injection molding product design for cost
effectiveness system. The focus of this section is two-fold:
(1) representation of parts and mold cavities for evalu-
ation, and (2) the representation of the knowledge for
cost effectiveness evaluation.
5.1. System framework
There are three environments in the system frame-
work, i.e. design environment, geometric reasoning and
model construction environment, and knowledge-based
environment (see Fig. 10).
The design environment provides functions for feature
design, preliminary design, parting line design, and detail
design. The geometric reasoning and model construction
environment includes a significant item extraction
module, a part model construction module and a feature-
based model refinement module. The part model con-
struction module constructs product model by extracting
geometric data and related attributes from CAD
database. The significant item extraction module identifi-
es feature and part shape characteristics and extract
significant items of these shape characteristics by per-
forming geometric reasoning on the part model and data
extraction form CAD database. The results of significant
item extraction are provided for further product model
construction. The feature-based model refinement
module constructs a feature-based mold model by map-
ping part features into mold features and deriving
mold feature relationships based on part feature relation-
ships.
The knowledge based environment contains know-
ledge bases to support the evaluations as discussed in the
previous section. The knowledge bases themselves are
supported by an object-oriented part model and an ob-
ject-oriented mold model, which are constructed by an
object-oriented model construction module.
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
Fig. 10. System framework.
5.2. Object-oriented part and mold models
In this research, object-oriented modeling techniques
are employed to model the product and the mold. One of
the purposes of using object-oriented technique is to take
advantage of its characteristics of data abstraction,
modularity and inheritance. The other is that the seman-
tic meaning of data can be enhanced, and most of all to
provide a compatibility with knowledge models and data
models developed in this system and thus facilitate com-
munication among the models.
5.2.1. Object-oriented part model
Using the concept of object-oriented modeling, a prod-
uct and its elements are represented in terms of objects.
A product is the aggregation of features and feature
relationships. Each feature relationship is associated with
two features. A feature itself is the aggregation of its
bounding faces and face adjacencies. Each face adjacency
is associated with its two corresponding joined faces.
Similarly, a face is the aggregation of its bounding edges
and edge connectivities. For the purpose of feature map-
15
ping, features are also defined in terms of their construc-
tion elements such as sections and trajectories.
One of the characteristics of the product model is that
it contains not only topological and geometrical details
but also technical information such as functional require-
ments and specifications of a product, and related evalu-
ation knowledge. The related evaluation knowledge is
defined as methods and embedded in the corresponding
product entity objects. This will facilitate the integration
of product geometry and design and manufacturing
knowledge.
5.2.2. Object-oriented mold cavity model
A mold set consists of a mold base and a mold model.
The mold base containing mold fixtures such as clamping
plates, support plates, and ejectors is used to hold the
mold model. Most of current CAD systems provide
a mold base library, which contains parts and assemblies
of standard mold bases. The mold model is an assembly
consisting of a mold workpiece, a molding, and a cooling
system. The mold work piece can have standard overall
dimensions to fit in the standard mold base, or it can be
16 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
custom-made to accommodate the geometry of the
product model. A mold work piece is split into separate
mold components by parting surfaces after extracting
the molding and cooling system from the work piece.
The mold which is located inside the mold workpiece
is an assembly consisting of mold cavities, a feed system
and a venting system. The cavities are formed by
extracting the shapes of the design product from the
mold work piece. Therefore, the product model can be
seen as the reference model of the cavities and the fea-
tures in a cavity corresponding to features in the refer-
ence part.
Similar to the part feature model, a mold cavity feature
model is also defined as an object consisting of an object
name, attributes, and methods. The attributes are the
properties of the features, while the methods define the
behavior of the feature. A mold cavity is the aggregation
of mold cavity features and their relationships as dis-
cussed in the part model.
5.3. Object-oriented knowledge model
(1) Knowledge representation and classification: Most
of the knowledge involved in cost evaluation can be
represented in terms of production rules. According to
the design for cost effectiveness framework, cost evalu-
ation knowledge can be classified into a knowledge hier-
archy with knowledge units corresponding to the tasks
and activities of the process model or the functional
blocks of the functional diagram. One of the objectives of
knowledge classification is to facilitate the management
of knowledge and provide basic construct for knowledge
abstraction.
(2) Knowledge abstraction: Each of the knowledge
units in the knowledge hierarchy is represented in
the form of a knowledge object as the abstraction of the
production rules behind the knowledge unit. Therefore,
the knowledge hierarchy can also be seen as knowledge
object hierarchy. The hierarchical relationships between
levels of knowledge objects are defined as methods in
upper-level objects. the lower-level objects are instanced
through activating corresponding methods in the upper-
level objects.
The purpose of knowledge abstraction is to facilitate
the management of a massive number of production
development rules and to assist the integration of know-
ledge with data and geometry. The basic idea is to group
the related rules and minimize the details of these rules by
representing them in terms of a concept. The concept can
be defined as an object consisting of an object name,
attributes, and operations. The object name is the name
of the concept, the attributes are the properties of
the concept, and the operations define the behavior of the
concepts. Objects that are working toward a common
goal can be further defined in terms of a higher level
concept.
The knowledge objects in the lower level of the know-
ledge object hierarchy are used for real assessment or
evaluation by running relevant production rules, while
the knowledge objects in the higher levels are mostly for
planning, monitoring, and controlling its lower level
knowledge units via methods or planning rules.
5.4. Implementation
The computer-aided integrated design for injection
molding system was implemented using Visual C##
language in a Windows-NT2+ environment, on an Acer
ALTOS 90002+ PC server networked with six PC clients,
located in the Computer-Aided Concurrent Engineering
Research Lab at National Cheng Kung University,
Taiwan, ROC. A commercial CAD system (Pro/ENGIN-
EER2+ from Parametric Corporation), a commercial ex-
pert system shell (Nexpert/Object2+ from Neuron Data
Corporation) and a commercial database system (Ac-
cess2+ from Micro Soft Corporation) were selected as
software components for the system’s development.
There are four environments in the system: a design
environment, a knowledge based environment, a database
environment, and a C# # environment. The design envi-
ronment, consists of a feature design module, a prelimi-
nary design module, a parting line/surface design module
and a detail design module, which are supported by the
knowledge based environment, a geometric reasoner and
the database environment. This system is fully integrated
with a mold design system, a mold manufacturing pro-
cess planning system and an injection molding process
design system, which form an environment for concur-
rent molding product and process development [19]. The
knowledge-based environment contains a product design
knowledge base, a mold design knowledge base and
a process planning knowledge base. Besides supporting
product design, the mold design and process planning
knowledge bases also support a mold design environ-
ment and a computer-aided mold manufacturing process
planning environment, respectively [20, 21].
5.5. Example
In this section, an example is given to illustrate part of
the functions of the computer-aided design for cost effec-
tiveness. Figure 11 shows part of the menu of the system.
(1) Feature selection: For selecting a feature. the user
is required to choose on-line evaluation or off-line evalu-
ation. The evaluations will be automatically performed if
on-line evaluation is selected, otherwise, the user may
activate the evaluation functional module whenever he or
she thinks an evaluation is necessary. Right after the user
selects a feature and specifies dimension values, the fea-
ture is displayed on the screen and a feature object is
created for evaluation. The feature evaluation knowledge
base is activated for feature evaluation by activating the
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21
‘‘feature evaluation’’ method in the feature evaluation
object. In this example, a shell is selected as the base
feature and a boss is selected as a secondary feature and
placed ‘‘on’’ the base feature (see Fig. 12). Feature evalu-
ation is performed on each of the features right after it is
selected from the feature library. No producibility error is
issued for both selections in this example.
Fig. 11. Part of the system menu.
Fig. 12. The example part.
17
(2) Preliminary design evaluations and redesign: Im-
mediately after the placement of the boss on the inside
of the shell, the feature interaction evaluation is per-
formed. One producibility error occurs. The part is too
heavy. One way of reducing the weight is to place a cored
hole in the boss. The evaluation is performed again on
the wall thickness of the cored hole boss. The wall thick-
ness of the cored hole boss is too thin at this time.
A modification is performed to place four ribs to
strengthen the wall thickness of the cored hole boss. The
cost effectiveness evaluation is performed after rib selec-
tion and placement. Fig. 13 shows the result of the
feature cost evaluation on the ‘‘ribs’’ and Fig. 14 shows
the result of cost effectiveness evaluation on feature
placement.
(3) Parting line specification: The parting line speci-
fication starts with the product designer checking out the
preliminary product model from the team library. The
product designer may specify the parting lines or surfaces
on the part and conduct design evaluations as discussed
before. However, as the locations of the parting lines will
affect the product detail design and mold cavity layout, it
is more reasonable for the product designer and mold
designer to perform the parting line or surface specifica-
tion collaboratively. Once the parting lines are initially
specified, the user is required to define the mold opening
direction, followed by undercut detection. A parting line
re-specification is necessary if any undercut problem oc-
curs. Using the part model with parting lines, the mold
designer may perform preliminary molding layout based
on the parting lines. In this example, the parting lines are
specified along the edges of the bottom face of the shell,
and the mold opening directions are both perpendicular
to the bottom face.
18 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21

Fig. 13. Results of cost evaluation on ‘‘Ribs’’.

Fig. 14. Cost effectiveness evaluation on feature placement.

(4) Detail design and redesign: Once the parting lines
have been determined, the detection of draft faces and
round edges are performed. Faces that are parallel to the
mold opening direction are considered to be drafted. The
user can add drafts onto these faces one by one based on
the draft angles suggested by the system, or let the system
add drafts automatically. A round is required for a con-
vex edge, while a fillet is required for a concave edge.
A proper radius for the corner or fillet is suggested by the
system based on the material used, the geometry of the
edge and length of the edge. The edge type and length are
derived and computed from the product model. Sim-
ilarly, the rounding and filleting operations can be per-
formed manually or automatically. Figure 15 shows the
example part before redesign and Fig. 16 shows the result
after redesign; Figs. 17 and 18 are the cost evaluation
results before and after redesign.
8. Conclusion
This paper addresses (1) development of a design for
cost effectiveness methodology that accommodates the
concepts of concurrent engineering, (2) an approach to
dealing with cost effectiveness together with other prod-
uct development concerns under an integrated design
framework, and (3) development of a computer-based
design for cost effectiveness module based on the pro-
posed methodology as an integral part of a computer-
aided integrated design for injection molding system.
Tasks in this research included characterization of
molding product design, development of a methodology
and procedure of product design for cost effectiveness,
development of a cost model to support design for cost
effectiveness, analysis of the relationships between geo-
metric characteristics and product cost, modeling of part
 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21 19

Fig. 15. The example part before redesign.

Fig. 16. The example part after redesign.

geometry, as well as the formalization of evaluation
knowledge.
The major practical results of this work include:
(1) A framework and methodology for design for cost
effectiveness, that accommodates the concepts of con-
current engineering. This provides a better method
for designing a product that fulfills the requirements
of cost effectiveness, functionality, and manufactur-
ability.
(2) A systematic approach for the development of a com-
puter-aided integrated design for cost effectiveness.
This approach and methodology can be employed to
facilitate the development of other computer-based
tools or systems.
(3) A computer-based design for cost effectiveness system
that provides a consistent and systematic method for
analyzing and designing the shape of molding com-
ponents.
The results of this research will facilitate the rational-
ization and automation of molding product design and
thus improve the efficiency, quality and reduce the costs
of product development.
In this proposed approach, functional requirement
analysis and system design are based purely on the
20 Y.-M. Chen, J.-J. Liu / Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing 15 (1999) 1—21

Fig. 17. The evaluation result of the example part before redesign.

Fig. 18. The evaluation result of the example part after redesign.

understanding of product and process development pro- Acknowledgements

cesses. The quality of the results are highly dependent
upon the experience and knowledge concerning current
related technologies. How this can be performed in a sys-
tematic way and what methodologies can be devised or
applied at these stages are still open questions which
require further investigation.
The effectiveness and usefulness of this system depends
upon the completeness and integrity of the knowledge
base. Unfortunately, there is no way to quantify these
aspects using guidelines. Some design rules may have
universal support but some depend upon the developers’
preference, experience and knowledge or the company’s
policy. Therefore, in order to use it as a production
system for a company, the knowledge base must be
revised and tailored for the specific company.
This research is funded by National Science Council,
Taiwan, ROC under Grant No. NSC-87-2212-E-006-
002.
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