SEMM1513

CHAPTER 5
CONCEPT
GENERATION
DR. MUHAMAD FAUZI BIN ABD RASED
Department Of Applied Mechanics And Design

School Of Mechanical Engineering

Faculty Of Engineering, UTM Skudai, Johor.
CHAPTER SYNOPSYS
• This chapter discuss about the several methods to generate concept design
based on PDS developed in previous chapter.
• The focus will be on Morphological Chart Method.
CHAPTER OUTLINE
• Chapter 5.1 : Creativity and Problem Solving
• Chapter 5.2 : Creative Thinking Methods
• Chapter 5.3 : Functional Decomposition and Synthesis
• Chapter 5.4 : Morphological Methods
• Chapter 5.5 : TRIZ: Theory of Inventive Problem Solving
• Chapter 5.6 : Axiomatic Design
CREATIVITY AND PROBLEM SOLVING

THE USE OF IMAGINATION OR ORIGINAL IDEAS TO

CREATE SOMETHING; INVENTIVENESS.
• Creative thinkers are distinguished by their ability to synthesize
new combinations of ideas and concepts into meaningful and
useful forms.
• A creative engineer is one who produces a lot of ideas.

- Linus Pauling
CREATIVITY AND PROBLEM SOLVING (CONT’)
ATTITUDE Develop a creative attitude
• To be creative it is essential to develop confidence that you can provide a creative solution to a problem.

IMAGINATION Unlock your imagination

• Ask “why” and “what if,” even at the risk of displaying a bit of naïveté. Scholars of the creative process have
developed thought games that are designed to provide practice in unlocking your imagination and sharpening
creative ability.
PERSISTENT Be persistent
• Most problems will not succumb to the first attack. They must be pursued with persistence.
• “Invention is 95 percent perspiration and 5 percent inspiration.” -Thomas Edison
OPEN MINDED Develop an open mind
• Having an open mind means being receptive to ideas from any and all sources.

JUDGEMENT Suspend your judgement

• Engineers, by nature, tend toward critical attitudes, so special forbearance is required to avoid judgment at an
early stage of conceptual design.
BOUNDRIES Set problem boundaries
• Experience shows that setting problem boundaries appropriately, not too tight or not too open, is critical to
achieving a creative solution.
CREATIVE THINKING METHOD
Sensitivity:
• The ability to recognize that a problem exists

Fluency:
• The ability to produce a large number of alternative solutions to a problem

Flexibility:
• The ability to develop a wide range of approaches to a problem

Originality:
• The ability to produce original solutions to a problem
CREATIVE THINKING METHOD (CONT’)
FUNCTIONAL DECOMPOSITION
• Functional analysis is a logical approach for describing the
transformation between the initial and final states of a system or
device.
• The ability to describe function in terms of physical behavior or
actions, rather than components, allows for a logical breakdown
of a product in the most general way, which often leads to
creative concepts of how to achieve the function.
FUNCTIONAL DECOMPOSITION
• Functional decomposition is a top-down strategy where a general
description of a device is refined into more specific arrangements
of functions and subfunctions.
• Here the emphasis is on identifying the functions and subfunctions
necessary to achieve the overall behavior defined by the PDS.
MORPHOLOGICAL METHOD
• The morphological chart approach to design generates
alternatives from an understanding of the structure of necessary
component parts.
• Entries from an atlas, directory, or one or more catalogs of
components can then be identified and ordered in the prescribed
configuration. The goal of the method is to achieve a nearly
complete enumeration of all feasible solutions to a design
problem.
• Often, the morphological method is used in conjunction with other
generative methods like the functional decomposition and
synthesis method
MORPHOLOGICAL METHOD (CONT’)
• The general morphological approach to design is summarized in
the following three steps.

• Divide the overall design problem into simpler

DIVIDE subproblems.

• Generate solution concepts for each subproblem.

GENERATE

• Systematically combine subproblem solutions into

COMBINE different complete solutions and evaluate all combinations
MORPHOLOGICAL METHOD (CONT’)
MORPHOLOGICAL METHOD (CONT’)
MORPHOLOGICAL METHOD (CONT’)

Concept 2 Concept 1 Concept 3

MORPHOLOGICAL METHOD (CONT’)
TRIZ Teoriya Resheniya Izobreatatelskikh Zadatch
• The better-known Russian acronym for this method, is a creative
problem-solving methodology especially tailored for scientific and
engineering problems.
• The basic premise of TRIZ is that the solution principles derived
from studying novel inventions can be codified and applied to
related design problems to yield inventive solutions.
AXIOMATIC DESIGN
• Suh’s methods provide a means to translate a design task into
functional requirements and use those to identify design
parameters, the physical components of the design.
• Suh’s principles lead to theorems and corollaries that help
designers diagnose a candidate solution now represented as a
matrix equation with function requirements and design
parameters.
“Styles come and go. Good design is a language, not a style”
- Massimo Vignelli
STUDIO ACTIVITY:
Generate 3 coffee maker concepts based on the morphological chart: