Intended learning outcomes: Describe release and engineering change control (ECC), particularly step-wise release. Present procedures in engineering for new product design or a new product release.
Release and engineering change control (ECC) is an organizational concept for the process of the design and manufacture of a new product or of a new release of an existing product.
Release control and engineering change control (ECC) coordinate the production or modification of all blueprints, bills of material, routing sheets, and all other common documentation on a product and its manufacture. The procedure is project oriented and step-wise releases new developments, or changes to existing products, to production. Project management of this kind includes the following tasks:
- Coordination of development and design: Planning the volume of the release, labeling of all items; stopping the use of these items for planning & control; request for change or new concept of products; quality control; design release of individual items; design release of all items belonging to the volume of the release.
- Procedures for production release: Transfer of bills of material and routing sheets; release of all items belonging to the volume of the release.
Step-wise release is particularly important to provide for the principle of simultaneous engineering (see Figure 5.4.1.3). For this reason, we often distinguish between:
- Rough-cut release for the production of a new development project or a new release: The data released base upon preliminary drawings. They are provisional and pertain only to the most important products and rough-cut bills of material and routing sheets. They include the most important components that allow activation of the procurement and production process at lower design-structure levels. Depending on work progress, several rough-cut releases are conceivable.
- Detailed production release with detailed documents: Project management of the new release ensures that all required documents, such as blueprints, bills of material, routing sheets, and numerical control programs, are available in detailed form. Project management then releases individual items, or all items, to detailed production.
This kind of step-wise release corresponds to common practices in planning & control, which works with various temporal ranges of planning and rough-cut or detailed structures.
Figure 5.4.2.1 presents the different tasks and phases that must be handled by the (systems) engineering (see Section 19.1) for a new product or a new release of a product.
Fig. 5.4.2.1 Procedures in engineering for new product design or a new product release.
Preliminary study and main study can result in provisional releases, while detailed study leads to final release.
Course section 5.4: Subsections and their intended learning outcomes
5.4 Logistics Business Methods in R&D
Intended learning outcomes: Produce an overview on integrated order processing and simultaneous engineering. Describe release control and engineering change control. Differentiate between various views of the business object according to task.
5.4.1 Integrated Order Processing and Simultaneous Engineering
Intended learning outcomes: Differentiate between time-to-product and time-to-market. Differentiate between order processing via serial processing and with overlapping phases. Describe some aspects to consider for integrated order processing with overlapping individual phases. Produce an overview on simultaneous or concurrent engineering.
5.4.2 Release Control and Engineering Change Control
Intended learning outcomes: Describe release and engineering change control (ECC), particularly step-wise release. Present procedures in engineering for new product design or a new product release.
5.4.3 Different Views of the Business Object According to Task
Intended learning outcomes: Disclose examples of different views of a business object. Present business objects and attributes in the areas of design, release control and engineering change control, and planning & control.
