Intelligent Design of Automobile Fixtures with Genetic Algorithms

The design of an automobile fixture system should meet several interference-free requirements while locating fixture positions, e.g. (1) interference-free among various fixture modules, (2) interference-free among work pieces and fixture modules during clipping and moving and (3) interference-free among machining tools and fixture modules. Furthermore, a good design also needs to minimize the cost by selecting proper fixtures from the existed modular fixtures under clip-force limitations in the specification. To achieve multiple complex constraints and cost-minimum requirement, real-coded genetic algorithm (RGA) is proposed to resolve the optimum problem. Comparing to the traditional try-and-error method, the design based on this work is obviously cost-effective and time-saving by cutting down the total deign time and fixture assembling time due to the capability of finding more precise and complete solution.