Modular Design

Abstract

Modular design refers to designing products by organizing sub-assemblies and components as distinct building blocks (i.e., modules) that can be integrated through configuration to fulfill various customer and engineering requirements.

Full text

Note: This is identical to the book chapter of “Modular Design” in CIRP
Encyclopedia of Production Engineering (2018 edition). Due to copyright
concern, the publisher’s pdf version is not shared. Happy reading.
How to cite:
Tseng, Mitchell M., Yue Wang, Roger J. Jiao. (2018) Modular Design. In:
Chatti S., Laperrière L., Reinhart G., Tolio T., The International Academy
for Production (eds) CIRP Encyclopedia of Production Engineering.
Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

Modular Design
Mitchell M. Tsenga, Yue Wangb, Roger J. Jiaoc
a Feng Chia University, Taiwan (mmtseng@mail.fcu.edu.tw, 886-4-24517250)
b Hang Seng Management College, Hong Kong (yuewang@hsmc.edu.hk, 852-39635234)
c Georgia Institute of Technology, USA (rjiao@gatech.edu, 1-4048949633)
Synonyms
Modularity
Definition
Modular design refers to designing products by organizing sub-assemblies and
components as distinct building blocks (i.e., modules) that can be integrated through
configuration to fulfill various customer and engineering requirements.
Theory & Application
Introduction
Modular design is basically to decompose complex systems into simple modules in
order to more efficiently organize complex designs and processes. The concept was
first introduced by (Starr 1965), in which the use of modular product in production
was proposed as a new concept to develop variety. It makes possible to modify
specific modules for a new requirement without influencing the main infrastructure,
so that the complex problems can be decomposed into several small ones. Modular
design concept has been employed in many fields of design and manufacturing.
The main advantages of modular design include design flexibility, augmentation, and
cost reduction. Due to grouping the components to each module, the designer can
easily modify each module instead of changing the whole design. In addition, the
system can be upgraded by adding new functions simply by plugging a new module
so that the system can be augmented within a specific range. Furthermore, the
modularized components also make possible concurrent engineering and flexible
manufacturing. Modular design classified all components in different products into
variant and common modules constructed in a core platform. By doing so, it becomes
feasible to customize large varieties of high demand products through achieving
economy of scale. Current product family design concept and process family
approaches are all based on the concept of modular design.
Modular design relies on the product architecture and product platform concepts.
Product architecture is defined as a scheme where the physical components are linked

to functional elements to form various products (Ulrich and Eppinger 1995). The
architecture can be designed as modular, generating a “one-to-one” relationship
between functional and physical elements. The purpose is to decouple each element
so that a change in one component does not influence changes in others in neither a
functional nor a physical way.
The platform is defined as “a set of subsystems and interfaces developed to form a
common structure from which a stream of derivative products can be efficiently
developed and produced” (Meyer and Lehnerd 1997). Compared to the architecture,
the platform concept emphasizes more on the configuration of physical components.
The platform is the foundation to build variants of modules to offer product varieties,
composed by the common modules shared among the product varieties in a family.
The platform is the key to achieve economy of scale, the same as the mass production.
According to current literature, the main challenges of the modular design are to
conceive the modular architecture and balance the variants and common modules in
the system.
Modularity and product architecture
Product architecture can be defined as the way in which the functional elements of a
product are arranged into physical units and the way in which these units interact
(Ulrich and Eppinger 1995, Jiao and Tseng 2000). It is quite obvious that all products
have some kind of architecture, even if it is not necessarily to have been considered
during the design phase (Lanner and Malmqvist, 1996). The choice of product
architecture has broad implications for product performance, product change, product
variety, and manufacturability (Ulrich, 1995). Product architecture is also strongly
coupled to the firm’s development capability, manufacturing specialties, and product
strategy (Pimmler and Eppinger, 1994).
Typically, product architecture design occurs during the configuration design stage,
that is, after conceptual design but before parametric design (Dixon et al., 1988).
Configuration design is the process of synthesizing product structures by determining
what components and sub-assemblies are in the product and how they are arranged
spatially and logically. Certainly, product configuration controls a product’s
fabrication and assembly characteristics. It also controls a product’s adaptability
necessary to respond to changes in customer requirements.
Often, a product’s architecture is thought of in terms of its modules (Ulrich and
Eppinger, 1995). A module is a physical or conceptual grouping of components.
Modularity is the concept of decomposing a system into independent parts or modules

that can be treated as logical units (Pimmler and Eppinger, 1994). Modularity has
been defined as the relationship between a product’s functional and physical
structures such that (1) there is a one-to-one or many-to-one correspondence between
the functional and physical structures and (2) unintended interactions between
modules are minimized (Ulrich, 1994; Ulrich, 1995; Erens and Verhulst, 1997).
There is some related research regarding decomposition and architecture at the system
definition stage of product design. The core research begins with Alexander (1964),
who describes a design process that decomposes (or partitions) designs into minimally
coupled groups. Simon (1981) continues by suggesting that complex design problems
can be described in terms of hierarchical structures consisting of “nearly
decomposable systems” organized such that the strongest interactions occur within
groups and only weaker interactions occur among (between) groups. Pahl and Beitz
(1996) and Suh (1990) build upon these concepts by modeling the functional
requirements of product design in terms of exchanges of energy, materials, and signals
between functional elements organized in hierarchical functional structures. Pimmler
and Eppinger (1994) extend Steward’s design structure matrix (DSM) model (1981)
to investigate the interaction issues and give considerable insight into product
architecture and decomposition. While interactions embody the technical aspects of
product architecture (Lanner and Malmqvist, 1996), the economic aspects of product
architecture design are dealt with by Erixon et al. (1996) through a method called
modular function deployment (MFD). Ulrich (1995) defines several types of product
architectures in terms of how the functional elements are mapped onto physical
components and relates the strategic importance of architecture choice to firm
performance. Henderson and Clark (1990) also point out the importance of
architecture by noting that established firms frequently fail when confronted by a
novel architecture. Ulrich and Eppinger (1995) provide a methodology for developing
product architecture, although interactions are only considered after the architecture is
chosen (Pimmler and Eppinger, 1994).
Modular design
The application of architecture and modularity to design results in modular product
design so as to accommodate agile product development (Anderson, 1997). Modular
product design refers to designing products, assemblies, and components that fulfill
various functions through the combination (configuration) of distinct building blocks
(modules) (Pahl and Beitz, 1996; Kusiak and Huang, 1996). From a study of seven
companies, Erlandsson et al. (1992) have shown that increased modularity of a
product gives positive effects in the total flow of information and material in a
company, from development and purchasing to storage and delivery.

Issues associated with modular design include (1) module creation/identification, (2)
interface analysis/evaluation, and (3) module selection/configuration, viz., synthesis.
Pahl and Beitz (1996) stress the importance of functional structures in modular
product development by classifying modular function space into basic, auxiliary,
adaptive, special, and customer-specified functions. Karmarkar and Kubat (1987)
discuss the module selection problem from an operations research perspective. Kusiak
and Huang (1996) present a graphical representation of product modularity and
propose a heuristic approach to module identification. Kohlhas and Birkhofer (1996)
develop a program system for the computer-aided development of structures for
modular systems. Their system focuses on the aspect of modular configuration.
Erixon (1996) systematizes procedures for modular product design mainly concerning
a matrix of modular function deployment (MFD) and design for manufacturability
and assembly (DFMA) analysis. The MFD focuses mainly on the evaluation of
module integration. Hillström (1994) proposes a method that helps the designer
clarify how interfaces between modules influence module functions and to select the
best interface location. His method is based on axiomatic design theory (Suh, 1990)
and contributes mostly to mechanical part design.
In summary, current practice refers to modules mostly as physical parts or
components in the context of manufacturing and assembly that lie in the process
domain. Efforts are rarely put on the functional and/or physical domains of design,
especially in terms of systematic planning of modularity starting from early
conceptual design stages.
In addition, current research investigates the architecture and modular product design
mostly in the context of a single product. Since manufacturing companies increasingly
develop product families to offer a large variety of products with limited development
and manufacturing costs, the architecture(s) for product families become more and
more important (Meyer, 1997). A limited literature has been devoted to addressing
issues regarding architecture(s) of product families (Erens and Verhulst, 1997; Ishii et
al., 1995). Ishii et al. (1994) investigate product family construction through
evaluating the costs and value of providing variety whilst the architecture(s) of
product families has not been dealt with explicitly. Erens and Verhulst (1997) propose
to use various product models to describe the architecture(s) of product families.
Essentially, they model the architecture(s) of product families as a packaging of single
product models, which fails to capture underlying characteristics of product family
architecture as different from architectures of individual products.
Fujita and Ishii (1997) point out one important characteristic to discern the
architecture of a family of products from that of a single product, i.e., the

simultaneous handling of multiple products. The implications of this simultaneity of
multiple product variants help us understand and capture the difference between these
two types of architectures. While the architecture of a single product is mostly
concerned with modularity, this research contends that the product family architecture
involves two characteristics of design: (1) the modularity of a product structure, and
(2) the commonality among product variants. This will be elaborated in Section 2.3,
together with class-member relationships.
A typical four step process to establish modular architecture is proposed in (Ulrich
and Eppinger 2000):
1. Develop a conceptual model of components and functions for a product;
2. Cluster the elements, regroup components inside of modules in the model
according to:
a) Assembly precision: two components are in the same module when a precise
assembly is required in order to reduce the number of precise operations;
b) Function sharing: when sharing the same components, two functional
elements could be designed inside a single module;
c) Technological simplicity: design module with the considerations in
technological simplicity and production advantages;
d) Localization of change: isolate the component in a module if it has a high
possibility of change;
e) Accommodating variety: isolate the components that are various within a
product family;
f) Enabling standardization: standardize a module if the product family share
the same components;
g) Portability interfaces: group components sharing the same flux type
3. Create a geometric layout to better detecting interfaces and modules;
4. Identify important interactions in the conceptual model to find modules and the
persons in charge of modules.
Multiple views of modular design

During product development, many different product descriptions can be recognized
for different business functions and in different phases of development. The
descriptions are represented by product models that act as a backbone for combined
product information (Krause et al., 1993). The product modeling framework is
constituted by the chromosome model (Andreasen, in his unpublished note of WDK
workshop in 1992), which is based on the theory of technical systems (Hubka and
Eder, 1988), complemented with “genetic” information that captures the origin of the
design characteristics (hence “chromosome”).
In the theory of technical systems, it is stated that four different types of models are
needed to describe a technical system and the transformation process that it affects.
These are termed as the process, function, organ and component structures, and are
said to define the design characteristics of the transformation system. In a design
process context, it is also necessary to have a model that states the goals for the design
process, i.e., the design specification. The specification and the structures are linked
by causal relations: the process determines the functions, the functions are created by
the organs, and the organs are materialized by the components.
Design process models describe the process of establishing the design characteristics
of a design object. Figure 1 illustrates one variant of the “overall” design process
model as indicated (Andreasen, in his unpublished note of WDK workshop in 1992).
Similar models are included in most textbooks on mechanical design (see, for
example, Hubka and Eder, 1988; Pahl and Beitz, 1996). According to these authors,
the design process can be described as a process in which an abstract problem
formulation in terms of a “need”, is successively transformed into a manufacturable
product description. The process can be divided into a number of major phases in
which particular characteristics of the system are established. These phases can be
divided into smaller steps where sub-problems are addressed, typically using the
general problem-solving approach summarized by Suh (1990). The general
problem-solving process includes a problem statement in terms of requirements and
objectives, the search for alternative solutions, and the selection of the “best” solution;
it leads to decisions that influence subsequent processes. It is only at this level that
there is some empirical evidence that this is a reasoning pattern followed by
practicing designers. These patterns are effectively described by the theory of
domains. This theory describes the design process in a more flexible way by
suggesting that the product chromosome (the set of design characteristics) should be
seen as a basic map, on which the process of the design process is charted.

{FFs} {TPs } {CAs}
Functional View Behavioral View Structural View
Functionality Technological Feasibility Manufacturability
No. Functional Specifications ( FRs )
1 3 o utput switcher: +5V@5A, +12V @2A, -12V@0.5A with 20 CFM
2 Wide input range: 85-2 64 VAC,47-63HZ (Universal)
3 Max Inr ush: 8,10 ,12; 16 ,20,24 (Cold)
18,23,26 ; 36,46,52 (Hot)
4 Hold- up time: 7,14mS@4 0W; 50,11 0mS@40W
5 Safety: UL,CSA,VD E
6 Line freq uency: 47 -4 40HZ
7 Line transient spec: IEEE5 87( ANSI /IEEE C62.41)
2.5KV,1.2u S Risetime , 50u S Dur ation
8 Line Fu se: F3.15A, 25 0VAC
9 Regulation & ripple: +5V,3A ,5A(f an),7A(peak),50mV,+/- 2%;
+12V,2A ,2A(fan),3A(peak),120mV,+/- 5%;
-12V,0.3 5A,0 .5A(fan),1A(peak),120mV,+/-5%
10 Fan: DERATE LINERALY TO 50% LOAD AT 60 'C
11 Temperature coefficient: +5V ,0.02%;+1 2V,0.02%;-1 2V,0.02%
12 Efficiency: @ FULL POWER>65% @ 5 0W OUT
13 EMI: FCC, Class B, Radiated, Conducted
VDE087 1: Class B, Radiated, Condu cted
14 Leakage curren t: 0.13uA @ 132V,60Hz; 0.24uA @ 256V,50HZ
15 Relative humidity range: 5-80%
16 Mean time between failures: 160 KH R min @25'C
17 Design life: 13 KHR
18 Main size: 6.20X3.20 X1.50
19 Weight: 1.25lb, 0.5 67k g
Figure 1 Modular design involving a FBS-view product model and cascading design
mappings
Consistent with the chromosome model proposed by Andreasen and design domains
(Suh, 1990), modular design should entail a FBS-view product model that evolves
through cascading design mappings. Figure 2 shows a FBS view based representation
of the modular design process. As illustrated in Figure 2, a product structure consists
of three distinctive views, viz., the functional, behavioral and structural (noted as FBS)
views. These three views are characterized by functional features (FFs), technical
parameters (TPs), and component/assemblies (CAs), respectively. Each particular
view captures a specific aspect of product information, involving functionality
(functional structures), technological feasibility (technological solutions/product
technologies), or manufacturability (physical structures). The transformation of a
technical system (Hubka and Eder, 1988), i.e., the design process, is instantiated by
mappings between views that embody the cooperation efforts between different
phases of product development.
No.Functional Specifications (FRs)
1 3 output switcher : +5 V@5A, +12V@2A, -12V
2 W ide input range: 85-2 64VAC,47-63HZ (Universal)
3 Max Inrush : 8,10,12; 16,20,24 (Cold)
18,23,26; 36,46,52 (Hot)
4 Hold-up time: 7,14mS@40W; 50,110mS@40W
… … … …… … … …
Functional Features
(FFs)
Technical Parameters
(TPs)
Components/Assemblies
(CAs)
Viewpoint-Specific
Product Architectures
Sales/
Marketing
Design
Manufacturing
/Logistics
Functional View
(Functionality)
Structural View
(Manufacturability )
Behavioral View
(Product Technology)
Views --
Integration of different phases of
modular product development
Mappings between views --
Integration of different modularity
Modular Design
Functional Modularity
Technical Modularity
Physical Modularity
Figure 2 Multiple views of modular design

Mapping between the views of modularity
While corresponding to and supporting different phases of product development using
a FBS-view product model, modular design integrates several business functions in a
context-coherent framework. This is embodied by the mappings between the three
views of modular design, as shown in Figure 2. Various types of customer needs
(customer groups) are mapped from the functional view to the behavioral view
characterized by solution principles (TPs and modular structures). Such a mapping
manifests the design activities. The mapping between the behavioral view and the
structural view reflects considerations of manufacturing and logistics, where the
modular structure and technical modules in terms of TPs are realized by the physical
modules in terms of components and assemblies through incorporating assessments of
available process capabilities and the economy of scale. The sales and marketing
functions involve the mapping between the structural view and the functional view,
where the correspondence of a physical structure to its functionality provides
necessary information to assist in negotiation among the customers, marketers, and
engineers, e.g. facilitating the request-for-quotation decisions.
Table 1 highlights the tasks and methods related to modular product architecture
development. In general, it takes place in two layers that deal with different aspects of
modular design. First, a variety of product structures are investigated through
systematic planning of modularity in three consecutive views, i.e., functional
modularity, technical modularity, and physical modularity. Such a modularity analysis
yields modules and modular structures in three views. As a whole, the results
comprise the architecture for configuration of modular product design. Then in the
commonality layer, for each module identified in the first layer, commonality is
studied according to various instances of this module (type). Similar instances are
clustered to form a group (variant) represented by a base value plus its variation range.
The linkage between two layers is manifested through class-member relationships in
between. While the objects in the modularity layer are module types (classes), the
objects in the commonality layer are instances of specific module types.
Table 1. Tasks and methods associated with different types of modularity
ISSUES IN
MODULAR DESIGN
PORDUCT DESIGN
FUNCTIONAL VIEW
BEHAVIORAL VIEW
STRUCTURAL VIEW
(1) Modularity
• Functional Modularity
• Technical Modularity
• Physical Modularity
Modules
• Functional Modules
• Technical Modules
• Physical Modules
Module Variables
•
Ws}{FFs,MFi 
•
{TPs}MTj 
•
{CAs}MPk 

Interaction
Measure
• FFs Relevance
• Design Coupling
• Physical Interaction
Modular Structure
• N/A
• Topological Structure
(Solution Principle)
• Configuration Structure
(Bill-of-Material)
Module
Identification
(Decomposition)
• Pareto Analysis
• Qualitative Classification
• Design Matrix
Decomposition (DMD)
• Interaction Matrix
Analysis (IMA)
• Modular Function
Deployment (MFD)
Concerns
• Customer Segmentation
• Technological Feasibility
• Manufacturability
Modularity and commonality
Modularity and commonality are the key issues in the modular design. Modularity is
decomposition of product structures and applicable to describing product type, and
commonality resembles the grouping of similar product variants of a specific product
type characterized by modularity (Jiao et al. 2007). Modularity of low granularity can
increase the absolute number of repetitions to reduce assembly cost and other related
cost, but it may defeat the purpose of modularity. The use of too many common
modules across different products may degrade potential product performance,
because the common components may not be optimal for the product. Therefore, there
is a balancing point of granularity. Either too fine, such as molecular levels, or too
rough, such as subsystems level, is not productive in perspective of mass
customization and the product variety. Designers should balance the commonality
with distinctiveness of each product in the family (Simpson 2004).
Much effort in academic research in the balance of the commonality and modularity
has focused on the tradeoff among cost, product performance and market impact. In
the tradeoff, commonality index usually serves as a proxy for the efficiency of a
product platform. A commonality index is defined as a metric to evaluate the degree
of commonality in a product family, in terms of the number of common components,
costs, and manufacturing processes (Thevenot and Simpson 2006). Various types of
commonality indices have been proposed in the literature, and almost all of them are
considered as a surrogate for estimating manufacturing cost and the foundation to
generate product varieties in a product family. For instance, one commonality index,
Degree of Commonality Index, proposed in (Collier 1981) can be interpreted as the
ratio between the number of common components in a product family and the total
number of parts in the family, so that it is very easy to calculate and roughly estimate
the manufacturing cost savings. The tradeoff happens when the customer’s preference
is taken into the consideration. Basically, the essence of proposed approaches is to
maximize the commonality of the product family without exceeding customer’s

preference loss tolerance.
Table 2. Implications of modularity and commonality in a product architecture
ISSUES
MODULARITY
COMMONALITY
Focused Objects
Type (Class)
Instances (Members)
Characteristic of Measure
Interaction
Similarity
Analysis Method
Decomposition
Clustering
Product Differentiation
Product Structure
Product Variants
Integration/Interaction
Class-Member Relationship
The concepts of modules and modularity are central in constructing an architecture
(Ulrich, 1995). Table 2 highlights different implications of modularity and
commonality underlying modular product architecture development. While a module
is a physical or conceptual grouping of components that share some characteristics,
modularity tries to separate a system into independent parts or modules that can be
treated as logical units (Newcomb et al., 1996). Therefore, decomposition is a major
concern in modularity analysis. In addition, to capture and represent product
structures across the entire product development process, a product architecture
achieves its modularity from multiple viewpoints, including functionality, solution
technologies, and physical structures. Correspondingly, there are three types of
modularity involved in the product architecture, i.e., functional modularity, technical
modularity, and physical modularity.
What is important in characterizing modularity is the interaction between modules.
Modules are identified in such a way that between-module (inter-module) interactions
are minimized whereas within-module (infra-module) interactions may be high
(Ulrich, 1995). Therefore, three types of modularity in the product architecture are
characterized by specific measures of interaction in particular views. As for functional
modularity, the interaction is exhibited by the relevance of FFs across different
customer groups. Each customer group is characterized by a particular set of FFs.
Customer grouping lies only in the functional view and is independent of the other
two views, that is, it should be solution-neutral. In the behavioral view, modularity is
determined according to technological feasibility of design solutions. The interaction
is thus judged by the coupling of TPs to satisfy given FFs regardless of their physical
realization in manufacturing. In the structural view, physical interactions derived from
manufacturability become the major concern of the physical modularity.
The relation between modularity and commonality is embodied in the class-member
relationships. A product structure is defined in terms of its modularity where module
types are specified. Product variants derived from this product structure share the
same module types and take on different instances of every module type. In other

words, a class of products (product family) is described by modularity and product
variants differentiate according to the commonality between module instances.
Figure 3 illustrates relations of modularity and commonality in product architecture
development. First, the modularity design space is developed. This design space
defines viewpoint-specific product modularity, including functional, behavioral, and
structural viewpoints. In the commonality design space, diverse instances of specific
modules are clustered into chunks. The mappings from the modularity to
commonality design spaces are defined by module instantiation and clustering of
module instances. In the product architecture design space, fragments of modularity
and commonality are incorporated from the respective modularity and commonality
design spaces to synthesis into a modular product architecture.
Modularity
Design Space
Functional
Modularity
Technical
Modularity
Physical
Modularity
Commonality
Design Space
Functional
Variants
Technical
Variants
Physical
Variants
Modular Product Architecture Space
FV
Instantiation
& Clustering
Instantiation
& Clustering
Instantiation
& Clustering
Variants &
Interface
Specification
Variants & Interface
Specification
Variants &
Interface Specification
Modules &
Modular
Structure
Modules &
Modular Structure
Modules & Modular
Structure
FV - Functional View
BV - Behavioral View SV - Structural View
Figure 3 Modularity and commonality design spaces and their relations in modular product
architecture development
Applications:
Based on modular product architectures, the so-called module-based product family
design (Ulrich and Eppinger 1995) has been an important stream of research in
product customization. The modular product configuration takes advantage of
modular components. The product module involves a one-to-one mapping from a
functional requirement to the physical product feature. The product infrastructure with
the specified decoupled interfaces between components allows each module to be

changed independently. The various modules can be designed independently to satisfy
customer's heterogeneous needs.
Modular based design has been applied in many products for mass customization,
such as cars, personal computers, and even high rise buildings. The key essence is to
leverage on modular design to decouple the modules which the customer can
participate in the co-design from others, so that the manufacturing process will not be
significantly influenced (Chen et al., 2009). For instance, the customer can configure
Dell’s computer by defining each module without changing the whole PC
infrastructure. Such modular design concept makes mass customization feasible and
affordable.
In addition, modular design also influences the flexible manufacturing field.
Reconfigurable manufacturing system relies on the various production modules which
enables the scalability in response to the market demand and machine adaptability to
new product requirements. Due to the flexibility and reconfigurability of the
manufacturing system, it can further stimulate product strategies such as mass
customization.
Cross Reference
Flexible Manufacturing System
Mass Customization
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