COVER STORY | GENERATIVE DESIGN
“We helped Airbus see how one
bay could be configured for multiple
wing types,” Anagnost continues.
“They use generative design to
explore how tools, locations and
configurations could be optimised
for this process, as well as all the
processes from all the variations
of the wings for the different
generations of the A350.
“We managed to reduce the
distance of the key travel paths while
also minimising congestion and
bottlenecks. Now, the line workers
are absolutely getting in their daily
steps, but they’re also spending
more time assembling the wings, it’s
a more productive factory and more
configurable factory.”
This was essentially just a proof of
concept for something much bigger.
Airbus is now using generative
design to optimise a new factory
for painting and assembling A320
engines in Hamburg, Germany, that
is due to open next year. The goal is
ultimately to assemble engines more
quickly with more efficient logistical
flows and a more content workforce,
in a factory that is expandable and
adaptable to meet Airbus’ needs both
today and in the future.
The reason Airbus has used
generative design to design a whole
factory is because the remaining
plot on the edge of its campus is
triangular and smaller than Airbus
would like. So Airbus explored two
paths, one examining what a bigger
building with a triangular footprint
might look like, and the other how the
same factory might be optimised to fit
into a smaller, rectangular footprint.
Ten different sets of variables were
identified to optimise for,
these covered the social,
environmental, financial
and operational aspects
of the design.
The social aspects
of the factory were a
key consideration as
Airbus wanted the best
conditions possible for its
workers. They also wanted a
building with the best possible
environmental certification. But
the factory needed to be affordable
as well as sustainable. So, Airbus
considered the major financial
drivers, the number of unique
structural members, the length
of these members, and
the building’s overall
footprint.
Cost matters to
everyone, but what’s
critical to Airbus was
the way the factory
operated. So, they
looked at the operational
drivers, different flow
paths through the factory.
The software plotted lines
representing the logistics flows
(loading and unloading and prepping
and inspection), jacking, jigging
and the many parts that need to be
assembled, and where and how
these parts would be moved to and
through the different paint booths.
“The generative design
system learned over time how to
achieve better scores,” explains
David Benjamin, head of The
Living, an Autodesk Studio. “After
identifying the options that were
best and mathematically solving
this 10-dimensional problem, we
further filtered the designs to show
only the super, super optimal ones
for the most critical goals which
were production efficiency and
construction costs. Then we worked
with the many project stakeholders
for this factory to select the best
triangular design option and the best
rectangular design option.”
Left: Current factory
floors are currently not
optimised for eficiency.
Centre: David
Benjamin, head of The
Living, an Autodesk
Studio.
16 WWW.EUREKAMAGAZINE.CO.UK | JANUARY 2020
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