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The advanced tutorial focuses on combined searches - when the MAS is used to find viable manufacturing processes and materials. First click "Reset" and then "Process Search" to make sure that you have a new search.

Make the following specifications, this time for a trash can:

• Batch size = 100000
• Shape = Thinwall (again!  many consumer items fall into this  category)
• Bounding Box = 2 ft x 2 ft x 4 ft is about 27000 cubic inches.  That specification eliminates a bunch of processes.
• Dimensional Tolerance = 75 inches^-3
• Surface Roughness = 250 microinches
• Wall Thickness (Click 'Advanced' in the data entry area) = min 0.1 inches, max 0.1 inches, and web 24 inches

So right now, it looks like sheet metal forming would be the winner, but let's switch to a material search and find out the best material for our needs.  Click 'Material Search.'

• These trash cans aren't going to be subject to any severe loads, so set the yield strength to 10 KSI-- that's still 10000 pounds per square inch! The only material eliminated is the photopolymers used by stereolithography.
• Set the Density to 300 lbm / ft^3 - We want the cans to be relatively light.  Steel is up around 490 lbm/ft^3
• Set the cost per pound down to 4, we're pretty cheap.

We now have some ranked material possibilities, in addition to themanufacturing possibilities. It's important to note that we haven't define either the process or the material facets. If you specify either of these facets, you've already decided on a process or material. So instead, you need to ignore these two facets, generate two separate ranked lists for processes and materials, and then use the 'Results Survey' to find the best combinations. Let's go ahead and combine them, click the 'Results Survey' button.

Surveying the Final Results

The two boxes at the top of the page are a summary of the viable materials and the viable processes. Materials are listed along with their rank (RM), and processes with their rank (RP).

Now each process can utilize some materials better than others.  For example, it is very easy to machine aluminum, moderately difficult to machine steel, and very difficult to machine titanium. Thus, every possible combination of process and material is given a rank (CP>M) from zero to 100 to indicate how suitable the material is for the process. A zero rank means the material cannot be used with the process.

What the final box lists is all of the feasible combinations of candidate materials and candidate process, taking into account the inherent compatibilites / incompatiblities. The final suitable combinations are shown in the figure below, with the final combined rank (RF) first, then the process name, the material name, and the suitability for that combination (CP>M).

The equation below shows how RF is calculated.

So for our trash can example, sheet metal forming with aluminum seems to be the best choice, with an injection molded thermoplastic coming in a close second. Here is a final picture of the tool on my screen.

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