Formalizing Flow Relationships in Data Archival and Reuse for Product Design

This paper explores the relationship between primary and carrier flows for design knowledge archival and reuse. Often, it is noted that flows (especially when modeling materials and signals) through an engineered system are accompanied by supporting flows (often energies). These accompanying flows (termed carrier flows), while being important to the overall (or black box) functionality of the system, are often of lesser interest during functional modeling activities related to conceptual design. However, when modeling a system for archival and reuse, not capturing these flows could hinder some of the more creative leaps where flows once used as a carrier flow in a system are now identified as viable primary flows. When systems are modeled utilizing primary/carrier flow designations, it may be easier to search and locate analogous systems. From a knowledge reuse standpoint, the physical solutions to carrier flows in one system may also be the physical solutions to primary flows in another design scenario. To assist with modeling, known primary/carrier flow combinations are presented in this paper. Modeling, archival, and reuse are presented, and the potential to identify creative leaps is explored.