Interoperability of CAD geometry and product manufacturing information for computer integrated manufacturing

Model-Based 3D engineering has gained wide popularity in recent times for various Computer-Aided Engineering applications, bypassing the need for 2D drawings, thereby creating an efficient digital thread, reducing development time and improving the product quality. With the use of model-based definition, most data required to design, analyze and manufacture aproduct is stored in digital format. The primary focus of the paper is to create aseamless digital thread for exchanging data from anative CAD file to astandard data format like ISO STEP AP242 and vice versa, which enables smart manufacturing by attaching product manufacturing information. Prior to STEP AP242, the only successful translation among CAD systems was for the boundary representation with very little or no manufacturing data. These standards will not be enough unless defined in amachine-readable format and are equipped with tools that can read/write from these data structures. The method presented enhances the neutral data format 'Constraint Tolerance Feature (CTF) Graph' to 'Augmented Constraint Tolerance (aCTF) Graph', which holds additional information required for manufacturing. This paper discusses the elements needed during CAD data exchange, for multiple CAE applications like Computer-Aided Tolerance Analysis, Computer-Aided Manufacturing, etc., and discusses the implementation of required translators.