This paper outlines the development of a virtual environment for constraint based assembly and maintenance task simulation and analysis of large scale mechanical products. It is important that allowance is made for maintenance activities during a products design phase to help reduce the lifetime operating costs of such large scale mechanical products. Unfortunately, current CAE systems do not support such assessment capabilities, with these issues typically being addressed using expensive and time consuming physical prototypes. The design and implementation of an immersive virtual prototyping environment for supporting the assessment of assemblability and maintainability of large scale mechanical products, along with its use as a maintenance training tool will be outlined. Procedures and environments for realistic component assembly, constraint recognition, automatic disassembly sequence generation, and maintenance review and training are presented. The simulation of maintenance operations allows for maintenance to be addressed early in the design stages. This reduces unforeseen problems creeping into the design as it progresses through its life cycle, consequently saving both time and money while improving product quality.
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