CAD/CAM

All of the engineering functions in design and manufacturing are included in CAD/CAM. During the year 1970s and early year of 1980s, CAD/CAM came into the picture. Engineering activities in design include product design, engineering analysis & drafting while the process plans and NC part programming come in the manufacturing functions. The literal meaning of CAM is the manufacturing of the products along with the aid of computers. Manufacturing is described as a chain of interrelated activities that comprises designing, production, material selection, planning, quality assurance, management & marketing of discrete consumer & durable goods. CAM includes these aforementioned manufacturing functions.

                                                                              Figure: The Scope of CAD/CAM and CIM

CAD/CAM signifies an integration of design & manufacturing activities along with the aid of computers. The conventional method of manufacturing a product that involves two separate procedures - designing the product & process planning - is a time consuming one and also involved duplication of effort by design & manufacturing personnel. These conventional methods are replaced by CAD/CAM. The direct link among product design and manufacturing is established along the help of CAD/CAM. When considering ideal CAD/CAM system, this takes the specific design of the manufacture since it remains in the database and is converted into a process plan for manufacturing a product. CAD/CAM system automatically converts design of a product into a process plan. On a numerically controlled machine tool, a large portion of the processing might be completed. CAD/CAM automatically generates NC part programming. Using telecommunication network, directly NC program is downloaded to the machine tool in CAD/CAM system. Therefore under CAD/CAM system, computer implements all of the functions such as NC programming, Product design and Physical Production.