Exploring relationships between life-cycle modularity and life-cycle cost.

摘要

Modularity has been considered as an effective approach to meet design and manufacturing issues while reducing costs. However, the relationship that increased modularity associated with decreased cost was based on an unproven assumption.; The previously established modular design method and life-cycle cost estimation method were improved and then applied to redesign three products and to estimate the modularities and life-cycle costs for each design. The modularities and life-cycle cost of the original designs of the other eleven products were also determined.; Statistical analysis in this research indicated that the relationship does not exist. Other marginal findings and problems of this research were also addressed. Based on that, recommendations have also been made for future research.