Revised paper from October 6, 1999

It is important for an architect to understand the limiting factors that will affect the design of a modular building. The implementation of modular construction as a means of improving production efficiency and worker safety in the construction industry raises into question the design quality of modular buildings, and whether or not the merits of the building process can also be captured from the perspective of the architect. For this reason, the constraints and barriers to design innovation in modular construction are recorded through the lens of an architect. This study uses interviews with modular manufacturers to extract information on the topic of innovation in the industry. Featuring a case study project as the platform for discussion, the opinions of experienced building professionals were sought to identify what is and what isn't possible. Among the primary constraints and barriers to innovation, including manufacturing costs, dimensional requirements based on transportation method, and the inflexibility of CAM software, the results of the study identified a need for architects to become better educated about modular construction in general. Therefore, the information presented is meant to be a teaching tool geared towards architects. / Master of Science

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-12T15:52:23Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 license.txt: 1748 bytes, checksum: 8a4605be74aa9ea9d79846c1fba20a33 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009 / Devido aos problemas relacinados com o gerenciamento e o raciocínio em grandes ontologias, um forte interesse e uma conseqüente investigação ativa em modularização de ontologias vem emergindo na comunidade científica relacionada à Web Semântica. Uma vez que muitas ontologias são preferivelmente grandes artefatos, para uma adoção em grande escala das mesmas, por exemplo, na Web Semântica, é necessário permitir que desenvolvedores de ontologias possam incluir apenas as entidades e axiomas que são relevantes para a aplicação que estão a desenvolver. Além da reutilização, o uso de modularização de ontologias é útil para muitas outras tarefas, incluindo suporte a queries, raciocínio distribuído, desenvolvimento em grande escala e manutenção de ontologias. Alguns abordagens para modularização têm sido propostas, no entanto nemhuma delas dispõe de uma ferramenta flexível que permita não só definição de módulos, mas também outros tipos de tarefas, como análise sintática e semântica, biblioteca de módulos e uma poderosa ferramenta para seleção de entidades. Esta dissertação propõe um conjunto de ferramentas, chamado ModOnto, para cumprir esses requisitos. Incorpora uma abordagem para modularização de ontologias que herda alguns dos princípios de Engenharia de Software Orientada para Objeto, que são o encapsulamento e o ocultamento de informação

Product adaptability is the capability to adjust a product by adding/replacing its constitu-ents for different applications. To acquire this capability, a product should be a modular structure that can form different modular combinations. The purpose of this thesis is pro-posing a design method to develop such products. The method includes the following characteristics: a product essentially implements its applications by providing proper ac-tions/reactions to interact with its surrounding conditions; such actions/reactions can be used to develop the subsystems of a product by building energy-flow or force-path con-nections; optional modules can be separated from the subsystems that contain optional applications; all modules are arranged as an open architecture to provide space and inter-face for each optional module; and each module is endued with the principal content of actions/reactions, inside energy flows or force paths, space, and interfaces constraints, so that it can be physically formed through a dual-domain formation process. Following this method, a multi-purpose electric vehicle (MEV) is developed. Adaptability Efficacy (AE) is proposed to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed method. / February 2017

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Submitted by Silvana Teresinha Dornelles Studzinski (sstudzinski) on 2017-02-08T15:13:58Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Ismael Sgarabotto_.pdf: 10957841 bytes, checksum: 233e088a6da314cf51c4e2a195349a7b (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-02-08T15:13:58Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Ismael Sgarabotto_.pdf: 10957841 bytes, checksum: 233e088a6da314cf51c4e2a195349a7b (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-12-09 / Nenhuma / O cenário econômico aponta para o acirramento da competição através do aumento da variedade de produtos e da redução do tamanho dos lotes de fabricação. O desenvolvimento de produtos modulares é, de forma geral, um conceito e uma solução aderente a este tipo ambiente. Por exemplo, produtos modulares geram a possibilidade da melhoria da percepção de valor agregado por parte dos clientes através da evolução conceitual e/ou tecnológica de um ou mais módulos especificados do produto. Alterando um módulo a engenharia de produto e a manufatura tendem a sofrer um impacto menor (em relação a produtos com concepção integral) e entregam a variedade que o cliente espera. Esta pesquisa tem por objetivo demonstrar como a modularização pode ser aplicada em empresas caracterizadas por atender a mercados de alta variedade e pequenos lotes. Para isto foi realizada uma análise da literatura de forma exploratória para fundamentação da teoria, e a proposta desta dissertação é a construção de um método geral para a implantação da modularização de produto. Por fim a aplicação do método proposto em uma empresa de médio porte testará os impactos deste conceito no ambiente prático, fornecendo dados reais para validação e ajuste do método de modularização de produto. / The economic scenario points to the intensification of competition by increasing the variety of products and reducing the size of manufacturing lots. The development of modular products is, in general, a concept and a solution adherent to this type of environment. For example, modular products generate the possibility of improving the perception of value added by customers through the conceptual and / or technological evolution of one or more specified modules of the product. By changing a module, product engineering and manufacturing tend to have a smaller impact (in relation to fully-conceptualized products) and deliver the variety that the customer expects. This research aims to demonstrate how modularization can be applied in companies characterized by serving high variety markets and small lots. For this, an exploratory literature analysis was carried out to support the theory, and the proposal of this dissertation is the construction of a general method for the implementation of product modularization. Finally, the application of the proposed method in a medium-sized company will test the impacts of this concept in the practical environment, providing real data for validation and adjustment of the product modularization method.

The digital wave that has engulfed the construction industry has in many ways changed how consultants work. The new working methods have created new conditions and opportunities for how architectural planning in construction can be conducted. Traditional planning is a project-oriented ETO process that can be compared with manufacturing of complex one-of-a-kind products (Jensen, 2014). Many consultants' business models based on the process gets criticized for not encouraging the reuse of solutions or development of their ways of working (Lidelöw, Stehn, Lessing, & Engström, 2015). In the manufacturing industry, processes based on the concept of mass customization are used. The purpose of these processes is to improve the flexibility of the final product, at the same time as the standardization and economies of scale is preserved in the components (Jensen, 2014). Modularization and configuration is central within mass customization. These concepts along with automation formed the basis of the study. The concept intended to incorporate these influences into traditional A-planning, is called room objects. Room objects are parametrically driven objects that collect furnishings and equipment as modules in a BIM environment. In this study the room objects has been developed as products families with the intention and ability to meet the underlying needs (Jiao, Simpson, & Siddique, 2007). The needs consisted of room layouts gathered from reference projects and regulations and have been identified through case studies. The needs have then been revised in stages to ultimately result in the design parameters used in the construction of the room objects. In this thesis, the development of the room objects has been delimited against WC environments. The technical use of the objects has been studied within the concept room objects. The result of the study is presented as a methodology for the use and management inside Autodesk Revit. A big part of the use consists of various tools in the form of scripts developed in the software Dynamo. The tools allow some operations within the use, and thus within the planning, to be automated. They also enable the creation of configurators outside of Revit that facilitates the configuration of the room objects. The analysis and evaluation of the flexibility and usability showed of the room objects, shows that room objects as concept has the potential to work in the phase of A-planning. The flexibility and modularity of the room objects could within the context of the work meet 97 % of the designs given by reference projects and 100% of the designs given by the regulations. The limits of the adjustment possibilities are situated in complex room shapes that require an advanced parametric basis. The usability of the objects appeared to be limited by technical knowledge. The configuration of the room objects requires an insight of the parametric construction. The modification of the room objects requires the user to possess an understanding of parametric modelling at family level in Revit. The alteration of the scripts demands knowledge of visual programming. The potential is there to solve or manage these limitations through technical means and suitable project organization. How the concept can be implemented purely in terms of the process should be further investigated. In this study, there has been a discussion of how the project group can be organized in order to fully utilize the benefits room objects can bring in terms of time savings, experience feedback and quality assurance.

This thesis questions the relation between political program and architectural production via a close examination of the modern myth: democratization through design. This idea is rooted in the 19th century arts and crafts movement, which indirectly caused the foundation of a very influential design school, the Bauhaus, where the idea of democratization of design has been invented. Years later, the slogan reappeared and became more visible than ever. This time it was IKEA, a furniture company that also promotes the idea of &lsquo / democratization through design&rsquo / with references to Bauhaus announcing the democratic design utopia is back. The survey of the study is based on four main principles that are developed at Bauhaus and later reinvented by IKEA. These principles, namely, mass production, standardization, modularization, and claim of universality characterize the modernist project of instrumentalizing mass production for social benefits.

Substantial step-wise advances and efficient work processes geared towards leveraging the modularization strategy to an optimal extent are needed in industry in order to maximize its potential benefit for capital projects because the industry suffers from low levels of application of the strategy. Due to this, this research focused on what changes to the traditional work processes within the industry as a whole and on individual projects are required. The ideas presented in this thesis seek to guide individual professionals and engineering organizations to create an optimal environment in which broader and more effective use of modularization can occur. / text