Paper ID #33486

Integrating Materials and Manufacturing Education

Dr. Claes Fredriksson, ANSYS - Education Division and University West, Sweden

Currently working as Lead Materials Education Consultant at Ansys (formerly Granta Design) in Cam-bridge, UK. Also an Associate Professor of Materials Science at University West in Sweden. Experiencein teaching subjects like Materials Science & Technology and Environmental Technology to students ofmechanical engineering at the department of Engineering Science since 1999.

c©American Society for Engineering Education, 2021

Innovative Software for Integrating Materials

and Manufacturing Education

Claes Fredriksson1,2 1Ansys Inc., Materials Business Unit, Education Division, Cambridge (UK) 2University West, Department of Engineering Sciences, Trollhättan, Sweden

Abstract

The Material Science Tetrahedron, which is sometimes used to define the scope of this subject,

connects the concepts of material processing, microstructure, material properties and

performance of the material in applications. This model can be the foundation for discussing

with students the impact of manufacturing processes to materials, such as heat treatments and

consequences of welding or machining to the microstructure of metals as well as the effects of

laser melting or sintering to additively manufactured (AM) components. On the other hand, it

also indicates that material properties play an important role in determining manufacturing

parameters, such as material removal rates or tool wear rates in machining.

The EduPack educational software was developed as the first computer-based materials teaching

resource at the Engineering department of Cambridge University. It consists of two linked

databases – one of materials properties (MaterialUniverse) and one of manufacturing processes

(ProcessUniverse). This is an ideal platform for cross-disciplinary teaching, not only for

materials and manufacturing subjects, but the embedded tools also support all types of

engineering design and product development courses; including materials and process selection

as well as environmental and sustainability assessment of products. The two main databases

contain around 4000 materials and 250 manufacturing processes, respectively, with informative

images and schematics facilitating understanding. An extensive number of comparable properties

are given in individual datasheets. All these properties are possible to visualize in colourful

charts (Ashby charts) that provide good overviews and a good basis for understanding and

decision-making. In this paper, relevant educational examples are shown that integrates materials

with manufacturing in a natural way.

1. Introduction and Background

Materials Science and Engineering is an exciting field of undergraduate education that brings

together the theory-heavy and often microscopic subject of materials science and the more

applied aspects of materials engineering. It is relatively small compared to, say, the more general

field of Mechanical Engineering. The subject is, however, of fundamental importance to

Mechanical Engineers and relevant courses are therefore incorporated into many such

educational programs. Departments, Courses, and Educators within these disciplines are

interlinked (see Figure 1) and both researchers and educators associated with Mechanical

Engineering often use the methodologies of Materials Science or Materials Engineering.

Figure 1. Venn-diagram of materials-related disciplines.

Manufacturing, on the other hand, is concerned with products, made by materials and deals with

how they are shaped and joined into useful and economically viable consumer objects. It brings

together societal aspects such as resource use, employment, infrastructure and waste issues (see

Figure 2).

Figure 2. Traditional manufacturing processes from material extraction to product (cars).

This paper considers the two interdependent entities, materials and manufacturing, as well as the

interaction between them and educational aspects. Primarily, it is a concept/best practise paper

that deals with the use of a widely available, well-established software for education, EduPack

[1], which supports teaching of Materials and Manufacturing for Engineering, Science or Design.

Mechanical Engineering

Materials Science

Materials Engineering

Materials Science

and Engineering

2 Methodology: Innovative software for materials and manufacturing education

EduPack (the software) is developed specifically for educational purposes but at the same time

forms part of a family of tools used for materials-related applications in industry and research

(Granta MI and Selector). Traditional Materials Science literature and courses are normally

Science-driven (see Figure 2), whereas this software was originally intended for a Design-driven

approach to Materials teaching (Figure 3) and is well known for materials and process selection

within technical design [2]. However, it also recognizes the underlying science, for example,

through the built-in interactive Science Notes, facilitating a more flexible on-demand approach to

learning. The visualization tools promote the understanding of the science behind material

properties. The underlying methodologies and databases behind EduPack have over recent years

been developed to support both or a combination of these approaches. In particular, a dedicated

database for materials Science and Engineering (MSE) has specific visual tools to develop the

understanding of microstructure and phase diagrams. Another database focused explicitly on the

Product, Materials and Processes (PMP) and their interactions is available. Both of these retain

have materials and process selection capabilities at the introductory level (Level 2). Three brief

examples are given in the consecutive sections to illustrate these methodology concepts in use.

Figure 3. The difference between a Design-driven and a Science-driven teaching approach [2]

3 Materials and manufacturing information in use for product design

The first example is the Product, Materials and Processes database (PMP) of the software, see

Figure 4 [3]. This has been available and was tested by several international higher education

institutions for over two years. Both materials and manufacturing processes play a key role in

achieving good design. This database is a computer-based platform for design students (be they

engineers or industrial designers) to explore the materials and processes used to make products.

It is product-centered, but unlike most other such databases, it also contains high quality data for

both materials and manufacturing processes, as well as background information about designers

and manufacturers. Over 200 designers were contacted to help in contributing to the database

with products that employ materials or manufacturing processes in innovative ways and used the

extensive internal information to populate the materials and process records of the database.

Figure 4. Linked data-tables constituting the Products, Materials and Processes database (left)

and an example of the visual and product-centered data-table for Sport and leisure (right) [1]

4 From manufacturing processes to material properties

The second example is the Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) Database of the software,

which specifically include two highly relevant [4] data-tables to explore the effects of heat

treatments and other processes to microstructures and material properties, respectively.

The Phase Diagram Tool

The interactive phase diagram tool (Figure 5) contains five different functionalities plus 14 phase

diagrams.

Figure 5. Home page icons for data-tables of the database (left) and a cooling path tool (right)

The Property Process Profiles (PPP)

Since one of the fundamental questions of Materials Science is how material properties are

affected by microstructure modification, 7 cases of prime importance are added in a data-table

(see Figure 7).

Figure 6. Overview of available PPP data (left) and application in diagrams for 3 cases (right)

5 From material properties to manufacturing processes

There are several properties, or attributes, associated with the material that, although they are not

strictly material properties, are very useful to the areas of manufacturing and production

technology. These are, e.g., Eco properties or estimated prices of materials from industrial

sources. There are also estimates of material-specific carbon footprints and costs for some of the

most common manufacturing processes, such as blow molding for thermoplastics or die-casting

for metal alloys. These enable life-cycle inventories (Eco Audits) of products and a simple

parametrized cost model for many of the 250 processes in the ProcessUniverse of the databases.

Figure 7. Compiled image of data record for blow molding, schematic and simple cost model

6. Summary and Conclusions

The methodology for (linked) materials and process selection was originally developed to

support the basic steps in the technical design process. It is implemented in the selection tool of

the software and it is described extensively elsewhere [2]. Aspects of pedagogy and student

feedback on the materials selection with excellent outcome have been previously reported [5]

and indications from colleagues using these databases before the Covid-19 pandemic were

positive. Here, we have focused on highlighting other connections between materials and

manufacturing processes that can be explored in various engineering and design courses, As

shown above, we have presented three examples of methodological concepts/best practise from

the EduPack educational software platform. These have been:

• The Product, Materials and Process (PMP) database that combines a visual product-centered

interface with information about main materials and processes

• The Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) database that contains many tools for

exploring the effect of heat treatments and other processes to microstructures of materials

• Extended materials data, such as eco properties (energy use and carbon footprint) for life-

cycle investigations or, as shown in this paper, price and cost information that enables

production cost to be assessed in a simple cost model.

References

1. See Granta Design homepage, URL: https://grantadesign.com/education (available February 3,

2020)

2. Ashby, M. F., Materials Selection in Mechanical Design (5th edition) Butterworth Heinemann,

Oxford, 2016

3. Figuerola, M, Lai, Q, Ashby, M., Kahlmeyer, E., The CES EduPack Products, Materials and

Processes Database - a White Paper, https://grantadesign.com/teachingresource/papers/

(available February 3, 2020)

4. Fredriksson, C., Melia, H. and Cesons, J., An Introductory Teaching Resource for Materials

Science and Engineering, Proceedings of the ASEE Annual Conference, Seattle (USA), June 14-

17, 2015

5. C. Fredriksson, An Innovative Digital Tool for Materials-Related Engineering Education,

Proceedings of the International Conference on Interactive Collaborative Learning (ICL), Dubai

December 3-6, 2014.