Companies use different methods to develop products. While some have an in-house team of engineers and technicians, others have to outsource the task or partner with a design engineering team. This article will discuss the benefits of using a team that specializes in design engineering for product development.
What is Design Engineering?
It is a vast field that involves handling the roles of different engineers. You can find a design engineer in mechanical, chemical, or electrical engineering. However, this field of engineering is usually associated with mechanical design engineering.
Furthermore, a design engineer uses engineering tools and skills to create equipment, systems, machines, products, or any material thing. Because they play the role of giving life to mechanical effects, they may take on specific or generic roles depending on the project’s complexity. You may want to read more about the functions of these engineers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_engineer.
You can hire engineers through an engineer recruitment agency. Some of these engineers are creative, creating new and peculiar concepts. Some are domain experts with good knowledge of how to improve a particular system’s features. Some of them are simulation experts when it comes to verifying the make-up of a product. They know the different kinds of analysis in the field of engineering (CAE analysts).
Hence, depending on what you want to produce and the industry, the duties of a design engineer may differ. However, the core of utilizing design and engineering methods to come up with products will remain the same.
Advantages of Using a Design Engineering Team
Here are the advantages of utilizing the skills of design engineers for your projects:
1. The Cost of Manufacturing Will Reduce
Every part you add to a machine has additional cost implications in purchasing extra materials, additional production time, and extra workforce. So, one of the critical things you will gain from a specialized team is reducing manufacturing costs. This is because the team has experience in that area and will help you develop a product that will still achieve the same result.
Additionally, each part of a machine has a limit to what it can do. This is referred to as part tolerance. Design engineers always consider this when putting machine parts together. Their experience in rendering precision machining services helps them know the parts that work best when placed together. They also know the parts that produce the needed motion, using straightforward means, when combined.
2. They Make the Product Easy to Manufacture
An excellent solution in machine production is when you use as few parts as possible to create complex motions. Assembly time and manufacturing costs will reduce when you remove spare parts.
Design engineers know how the equipment or machine will be assembled in the factory. And the assembly pattern is also essential since they have to test the device after assembling it before closing the casing or housing.
The best assembly method is the topside down process, where the mechanical parts are all installed on the top side of the housing. The team of engineers you choose should have experience in the tricks of this method.
3. You Will Get Designs that Function Better
A good team will assess the possibilities of arriving at your desired product function. Due to their experience, they know different methods that can achieve that function. They have witnessed and created various mechanisms.
They also have tested processes for assessing and determining which function will serve you better based on ergonomics, preference of consumers, reliability, manufacturing, and cost.
4. You Will Have a Greater Chance of Owning the Intellectual Property
Many machines have the same mechanical concept. This explains why you cannot request a patent. However, a strong team with good team dynamics will know how to pass ideas around and churn out new concepts from each other. This can result in the formation of new ideas. A few twists or unique features to a fundamental concept can make it different and patentable.
Those simple twists will make the machine perform better or do something else that you did not have in your original plan. These changes provide the material for a patent.
Conclusion
We have discussed the roles of design engineers and how you can benefit from their skills. So, before you start your next engineering project, ensure you get them involved.