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In the context of large-scale partnerships, developing complex systems (such as aeronautical prod-ucts) is a collaborative and distributed work involving several domains/disciplines, teams, processes, design environments, tools and modelling languages. In such a context, engineering data have to be processed and managed in the most consistent way so as to be used by all the partners and through the different activities. System design, integration and simulation are essential phases for the verifica-tion and optimization of system capabilities. Due to the increasing complexity of aeronautical products, the Systems Engineering approach, offering multi-domain, multi-actors and multi-level system charac-terization, can significantly contribute to the subsystem consistency insurance within the integration phase. The main objective of the integration phase is to validate the global behaviour of a system based on carefully planned and chosen numerical simulations. Depending on the considered discipline and the kind of performed analysis, these numerical simulations require defining specific models of prod-uct architecture in order to create the required simulation models. A major issue for the integrator is to manage these models in order to identify the relevant data set to be used for the simulation and to organize this data set into a new adapted product structure and “engineering environment”. Further-more, integrating numerous components in complex system design is iterative and often produces large scale intermediate data with heterogeneous formats and multiple relationships.
During the last decade, The Digital Mock-Up (DMU) – supported by Product Data Management (PDM) systems – became a key integrated environment to exchange/share a common 3D model-based product definition between design teams. It gives to designers and downstream users (analysts) an access to the geometric definiton of product assembly. While enhancing 3D and 2D simulations in a collaborative and distributed design process, the DMU offers new opportunities for analysts to retrieve the appropriate CAD data inputs used for Finite Element Analysis (FEA); allowing hence to speed-up the simulation preparation process. However, current industrial DMUs suffer from several limitations among which: the lack of flexibility in terms of content and structure, the lack of digital interface ob-jects describing the relationships between its components and a lack of integration with simulation activities and data.
The PhD introduces the concept of multi-disciplinary digital integration chains which are multi-level design-simulation loops where sub-systems models and data (potentially coming from several disciplines) are integrated to enable the prediction of global system behaviour, and hence verifying the compliance with expected system performances. In the context of digital integration chains, the PhD especially underlines the DMU transformations required to provide adapted DMUs that can be used as direct input for FEA of large assembly. These transformations must be consistent with the simulation context and objectives and lead to the concept of “Product View” applied to DMUs and to the concept of “Behavioural Mock-Up” (BMU). A product view defines the link between a product representation and the activity or process (performed at least by one stakeholder) that use or generate this represen-tation. The BMU is the equivalent of the DMU for simulation data and processes. Beyond the geometric definition, which is represented in the DMU, the so-called BMU should logically link all data and models that are required to simulate the physical behaviour and properties of a single component or an as-sembly of components.
The key enabler for achieving the target of extending the concept of the established CAD-based DMU to the behavioural CAE-based BMU is to find a bi-directional interfacing concept between the BMU and its associated DMU. This concept is the kernel of the Design-Analysis Integration Framework (DASIF) proposed in this PhD. This framework might be implemented within PLM/SLM1 environments and interoperate with both CAD-DMU and CAE-BMU environments. DASIF combines configuration data management capabilities of PDM systems with system modelling concepts of MBSE and Simula-tion Data Management capabilities. In PhD dissertation, the PDM and System Modelling capabilities and related concepts of DASIF are described as well as the related data model to be implemented.
This PhD has been carried out within a European research project: the CRESCENDO project which aims at delivering the Behavioural Digital Aircraft (BDA). The BDA concept might consist in a collabo-rative data exchange/sharing platform for design-simulation processes and models throughout the de-velopment life cycle of aeronautical products. Within this project, the Product Integration Scenario and related methodology have been defined to handle digital integration chains and to provide a test case scenario for testing DASIF concepts. Latter have been used to specify and develop a prototype of an “Integrator Dedicated Environment” implemented in commercial PLM/SLM applications (CATIA/SIMULIA V6 and Teamcenter for Simulation 9). These prototypes have permitted to assess the current commercial tools maturity regarding these concepts and to have a feedback regarding the fea-sibility of their implementation. Finally the conceptual data model of DASIF has also served as input for contributing to the definition of the Behavioural Digital Aircraft Business Object Model: the stand-ardized data model of the BDA platform enabling interoperability between heterogeneous PLM/SLM systems and to which existing local design environments and new services to develop could be pluged.