DESIGN FOR ASSEMBLY

COURSEWORK ASSIGNMENT No. 2

Redesign of Retractable
Ballpoint Pen

Philip Yeung
B525185

November 2018
Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

Table of Contents
1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 1
1.1 Aims & Objectives ................................................................................................................... 1
2 Current Retractable Ballpoint Pen Design ...................................................................................... 2
2.1 Assembly Sequence ................................................................................................................ 3
2.2 Boothroyd Paper Based Method of Current Pen Design ........................................................ 4
2.3 Boothroyd DFMA Software Analysis of Current Pen Design................................................... 4
2.4 Lucas Paper Based Method of Current Pen Design ................................................................ 7
3 Redesign .......................................................................................................................................... 8
3.1 Assumptions ............................................................................................................................ 8
3.2 New Pen Design ...................................................................................................................... 8
3.3 Assembly Sequence for New Design ....................................................................................... 9
3.4 Boothroyd Paper Based Method of New Design .................................................................... 9
4 Discussions .................................................................................................................................... 10
4.1 Issues with Assembly Automation ........................................................................................ 10
5 Conclusions ................................................................................................................................... 10
6 Appendix ....................................................................................................................................... 11
1 Introduction
Manufacturing of ball point pens is a relatively competitive business. Companies try to find ways to
cut down the cost of manufacturing to increase sales and market share. I am going to redesign a
particular ballpoint pen from a company which currently assembles all their ballpoint pens manually.
Assembly process constitutes a large portion of the overall manufacturing cost of the ballpoint pens.

The aim of this report is to demonstrate product simplification of a retractable ball point pen using
the DFA evaluation technique of Boothroyd and Lucas. In this report I am going to analyse the design
of a retractable ball point pen in relation to its ease of manual assembly and then redesign the pen
by reducing the number of parts and materials. I am also going to discuss about the issue of
automating the assembly process of the pen.

1.1 Aims & Objectives

Aims:

• Reduce the number of parts of the pen.

• Reduce assembly time of the pen.
• Simplify the assembly process.
• Reduce product cost. (materials, manufacturing, overheads, etc)
• Increase assembly efficiency.

Objectives:

• Workout assembly time and cost using Boothroyd and Lucas methods.
• Obtain and analysis results from Boothroyd DFMA software.
• Redesign a pen based on results from analysis.
• Analysis and compare new pen design to original design using the Boothroyd paper based
method.

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

2 Current Retractable Ballpoint Pen Design

Figure 1 - Retractable ballpoint pen exploded view drawing

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

Table 1 - Retractable ballpoint pen components details

The current design of the retractable ballpoint pen consists 9 parts in total shown in figure 1. The
lower body, slider, push button and upper body are made of injection moulded plastic and the ring,
spring, end cap and clip are made of steel. α is the rotational symmetry of a part about an axis
perpendicular to the axis of insertion and β is the rotational symmetry of a part about its axis of
insertion. There is difficulty when handling the ring, end cap and clip during manual assembly
process as the parts are quite small and slippery. Only 4 out of 9 parts are functional which means
there are 5 unnecessary parts in the pen assembly that could potentially be eliminated to reduce
cost and shorten the manufacturing time.

2.1 Assembly Sequence

There are multiple ways to assemble the retractable ballpoint pen. I have chosen to break down the
assembly into 3 parts: main assembly, upper body subassembly and push button subassembly.

Main assembly
1) Place lower body in fixture (pointed end faces down)
2) Insert ring on lower body
3) Drop spring into lower body
4) Place refill in lower body

Sub-assembly A
5) Place upper body in fixture (thread faces down)
6) Insert clip on upper body
7) Reorient upper body (thread faces up)

Sub-assembly B
8) Place end cap in fixture (hole faces up)
9) Press fit plastic push button into end cap

10) Drop sub-assembly B into sub-assembly A (end cap faces down)

11) Drop plastic slider into upper body (pointed end faces down)
12) Push and lock plastic slider in place
13) Screw upper and lower body together

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

2.2 Boothroyd Paper Based Method of Current Pen Design

Table 2 - Boothroyd paper based method results of current pen

Boothroyd paper based method was used to analysis the manual assembly of the retractable
ballpoint pen. The assembly time was estimated to be 64.89 seconds with a design efficiency of 18%.
There are 4 theoretical number of minimum parts and the estimated assembly cost is 0.26USD.
Values in red indicates room for improvement. The manual handling time of the ring, clip and end
cap are slightly longer because of they are small in size and slippery which makes it difficult to
handle. Insertion time of the clip, assembly reorientation and screwing the upper body to the lower
body take up significantly amount of time during the assembly process.

2.3 Boothroyd DFMA Software Analysis of Current Pen Design

The current pen design was analysed using the

Boothroyd DFMA software. The total process time
comes to 66.24 seconds with an estimation process cost
of $0.86USD. The process time is significantly higher with
the ring, clip, end cap, press fitting operation, push slider
in place with tool and thread tightening operation.

Table 3 - Process time & cost

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

Figure 2 below shows the product structure. There are one main assembly and 2 sub-assemblies
with 9 parts in total.

Figure 2 - Product structure chart

Table 4 below shows the break down of the assembly labour time in seconds. Approximately 32% of
the assembly labour time was spent on parts that are candidates for elimination and about 38% of
the assembly labour time was spent in separate assembly operations. The design efficiency of the
current pen design is about 21% which is significantly lower than the suggested threshold of 60%.

Table 4 - Assembly labour time & design efficiency

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

Table 5 - Category 1 suggestion

Eliminate parts shown in table 5 above by incorporating features into other functional parts. The ring
and end cap are just there for aesthetics purpose therefore it could be eliminated without affecting
the functionality of a retractable pen. The metal clip can be incorporated with the upper body as it
doesn’t have to be a metal part. The upper body can potentially be eliminated by extending the
lower body and add a snap fit on the push button to secure all the components in place. Plastic
slider can perhaps be replaced with a simpler mechanism to lock the refill in position.

Table 6 - Category 2 suggestion

Press fitting operation can be eliminated by removing the silver end cap on the plastic push button
as it is only there for aesthetics puprose. The operation of pushing the slider in place with tool can
be eliminated by redesigning the refill locking mechanism. Threaded fastening of the upper and
lower body can be replaced by snap fitting. Reorientation is not nesseccary during the assembly
process if upper body and clip are removed.

Table 7 - Category 3 suggestion

Removing the clip, ring and end cap will eliminate most of the handling or insertion difficulties
during the assembly process. The clip is slippery and thin which makes it difficult to handle and align
to the slot on the upper body. The ring and end cap are small and slippery which makes them
difficult to handle and insert.

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

2.4 Lucas Paper Based Method of Current Pen Design

Table 8 - Lucas paper based method results of current pen

Lucas paper based method was used to analysis the manual assembly of the retractable ballpoint
pen. Values in red indicates room for improvement. The insertion index of the ring and clip are over
1.5 which means they need to be improved. The assembly index of the push button press fit and
screwing the upper and lower bodies together are quite high and should be reduced by redesign.
The design efficiency is 44% which is lower than the suggested minimum of 60% based on a good
design. The handling ratio is 3.23 which is over the recommended value of less than or equal to 1.5.
Finally the assembly ratio is 5.78 and the suggest threshold is less than or equal to 2.5.

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

3 Redesign

3.1 Assumptions

• Assuming the aesthetics of the pen is not important.

• Assuming the refill is not replaceable. (users won’t need to disassemble the pen and change
the refill during its product lifetime)
• Assuming the refill is a standardised component and changes will not be made to it.

3.2 New Pen Design

The new design of the retractable ballpoint pen is shown below in figure 3. It consists 5 parts instead
of 9. Upper and lower bodies are combined to one and the end cap and slider are removed. The
retractable mechanism has been redesigned to a simple latching mechanism.

Figure 3 - New pen design (assembled)

Screwing, push slider in place with tool and reorient processes have been eliminated.

Figure 4 - New pen design (exploded view)

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

3.3 Assembly Sequence for New Design

1) Place body in fixture (pointed end faces down)

2) Drop spring into body
3) Drop refill into body
4) Drop push button into body (align holes to groove)
5) Press fit clip into push button

3.4 Boothroyd Paper Based Method of New Design

Table 9 shows the details of all 5 parts of the new pen design. The new clip is made of plastic instead
of steel and it is easier to handle compared to previous design.

Table 9 - New parts list

Boothroyd paper based method was used to analysis the manual assembly of the new pen design.
The assembly process is simplified by removing all the sub-assembles.

Table 10 - Boothroyd paper based method results of new pen

Table 11 below shows the comparison of the old and new pen design. The total assembly time of the
new pen decreased 61%, from 64.89 to 23.04 seconds and the operation cost reduced from
$0.26USD to $0.09USD. Design efficiency of 65% which is above the recommended threshold.

Table 11 - Old vs new pen design

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

4 Discussions

4.1 Issues with Assembly Automation

High initial setup cost is needed for a company to move from manual assembly lines to automated
assembly line. Labour cost, production time and product cost per unit will reduce significantly which
allow the pen to have a more competitive edge in the market.

Advantages:
• Able to manufacture pens 24/7 without taking breaks
• High speed and accuracy if setup correctly
• Eliminate human errors
• Low unit cost

Disadvantage:
• High initial investment costs
• Long payback time
• Often not flexible / doesn’t response to changes rapidly

According to Boothroyd Assembly method selection chart 1-1, the new pen assembly with 5 parts
would require an annual production volume of approximately 350,000 units to justify automated
assembly with a single robot arm based on a payback period of 4 shift years. For the old pen design
with 9 parts, an annual production volume of 700,000 is required for a multi-station with robots. The
new pen design is more suitable for automated assembly process than the old design as it consists
fewer parts and assembly processes are far more simpler.

5 Conclusions
Both Boothroyd and Lucas Methods have proven that the old pen design has a low design efficiency
and there are numbers of unnecessary parts within the pen assembly. After analysing the old design
I came up with a new pen design which only consists 5 parts with design efficiency increases from
18% to 65% based on the Boothroyd paper based method. Subassemblies, reorientation, screw
fastening operation are removed for the new pen design. The operation time decreased from 64.89
seconds to just 23.04 seconds. Fewer parts means less inventories, less operations and less material
costs which have a direct effect on the product cost. Shorter operation time means more pens can
be made in the same period of time which also have a positive impact on the product cost.

Boothroyd and Lucas methods are both different approaches in design for assembly. Lucas method
does not require specific dimensions or weights of all the parts. On the other hand, the Boothroyd
method requires dimensions and symmetry of all the parts. Lucas method is more simplified as it
requires less parts details and the tables are easier to interpret. However, the Boothroyd DFA
software is far more accurate for specific manufacturing processes once all the parameters are setup
correctly.

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Design for Assembly – Retractable Ballpoint Pen Philip Yeung B525185

6 Appendix

11
The potential role of DFMA
in the product development process

Philip Yeung
B525185

November 2018
Philip Yeung B525185

Introduction
The aim of this report is to identify the potential role of Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DFMA)
in the product development process. I am going to discuss how Southco implements DFMA into their
product development process to help them to increase profitability of their business while maintaining
the quality and functionality of the products they delivery to their customers.

Product Development Process

Product development is a process of taking a product from initial
concept to market. There are different approaches to product
development; every companies do it in a slightly different way,
depending on the type of industries and size of the company. In
general, there are 8 basic stages in the product development
process: Research, concept generation, concept screening, concept
development, prototyping & testing, analysis, final development,
and launch. It is important to apply DFMA knowledge at early stage
of the product development process rather than leaving it right
before the manufacturing stage as the cost of change increases
exponentially during the design process, shown in figure 2. 85% of
manufacturing costs are determined in the early stages of design
which means making the right design decisions during the concept
stage could potentially save you a lot of money. [1] DFMA softwares
can help design engineers to make decisions and provide potential
design solutions to help to reduce cost.
Figure 1 - DFA software average reductions [2]

Figure 2 - Design process timeline [3]

Case Study
The aim of implementing design for manufacture and assembly techniques into a design is to reduce
the number of parts, manufacture or assembly time and more importantly the product cost without
reducing the quality or performance of a product. The application of DFMA can be seen in majority of
technology or manufacture companies. The goal of most companies is to sell products or services with

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Philip Yeung B525185

profit margin as high as possible, the easiest and most effective way to achieve that is to reduce
manufacture and assembly cost of a product.

Southco is a manufacturer of latches, hinges, fasteners, inject/eject mechanisms and other access
hardware for enclosures and cabinets. Over 30% of their business are custom made products. Southco
believes first impressions are critical and they focus on quality, performance, aesthetics and
ergonomics of their products. They offer over 25,000 standard catalogue products and over 50,000
custom made products that were designed specifically for their customers according to their design
needs. [4]

A customer was looking for a load-bearing counterbalance hinge to replace the current one on their
enclosure. Southco then asked their customer to send them the current hinge for evaluation so that
they can propose a custom design and provide an estimated cost. It turns out that the manufacturing
cost of that custom design hinge was almost the same price as what the customer was willing to pay,
leaving almost no profit margin for Southco. By using DFMA, the product development team at
Southco was able to reduce the number of parts, assembly time and assembly cost of the custom
design hinge which increased the profitability of the custom hinge while maintaining the quality and
functionality of the hinge.

Figure 3 - Preliminary & final hinge design [5]

The total number of parts and operations of the hinge was reduced by 71%, it went down from 45 to
just 13. Figure 3 above shows the old hinge design on the left and the final design on the right. The
new hinge design consists significantly less number of fasteners which reduces the assembly time as
fasteners could be quite fiddly during the assembly process. The tooling cost has also been reduced
by eliminating three stamping dies, one tapping operation and one screw-driving operation.

Conclusion
In conclusion, DFMA is an important part throughout the product development process. It is important
to implement it on the early stage of the design process rather than leaving it right before the
manufacturing stage. The main purpose of DFMA is to reduce product cost without reducing the
quality or performance by reducing the number of parts, manufacture or assembly time. Design
engineers can spend years come up with an excellent product idea but if you can’t manufacture or
assemble the product you won’t be able to launch it to the market and wasted years of development
time. DFMA is an important technique for most companies; specially for technology or manufacture
companies. Saving seconds per unit during the assembly time could potentially save millions of pounds
for products with high volume of sales.

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Philip Yeung B525185

References

[1] Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc.. (n.d.). DFMA. Retrieved November 16, 2018, from
http://www.dfma.com/software/dfma.asp

[2] Boothroyd Dewhurst, Inc.. (n.d.). DFMA [Dataset]. Retrieved November 16, 2018, from
http://www.dfma.com/software/dfma.asp

[3] Stienstra, D. (n.d.). Introduction to design for (cost effective) assembly and manufacturing
[Illustration]. Retrieved from http://me.gatech.edu/files/capstone/L071ME4182DFA

[4] Southco. (n.d.). About Us - Southco. Retrieved November 16, 2018, from
https://www.southco.com/en-gb/company/about-us.html

[5] Southco. (n.d.-b). At Southco, Great Design Hinges on DFMA. Retrieved November 16, 2018, from
http://www.dfma.com/resources/southco.asp