There are approximately 40,000 – 80,000 materials worldwide.

These numbers are increasing at an unbelievable rate Many of these materials and processes are unfamiliar and new – in fact, no engineer can have detailed knowledge of more than a fraction of them.

Getting it ‘right the first time’ by selecting the optimal combination of material for a specific product has enormous benefits to any new product or process. Correct Selection leads to lower product costs, faster time-to-market, reduction in failures, and most of all introduces new innovation resulting in compelling advantages over the competition.

Then there are demanding and shifting design requirements and performance: 
Material Specification
Mechanical Properies
Thermal Properties
Conductivity and Insulation
Degredation
Form
Cost
Safety
Risk
Aesthetics
Environmental impact
Recyclable capability.

Organizations are constantly generating new materials and process knowledge that is specific and highly relevant to their own area of business. Capturing this knowledge, sharing it, and making use of it is where ID come in hand by undertaking the following:

ID develop a profile of the ideal material that will satisfy the design requirements of the product.

This process must take into consideration all elements that impact the form, fit and function criteria developed during the initial design phase. Part performance, quality, safety and cost must be considered in selecting the optimal material for the product. In design engineering we relate form, fit and function of the design to the physical, mechanical, processing, regulatory and commercial characteristics of the available materials in order to optimise the material selection process. Today, this is by and large a manual process, however leading edge solutions are becoming available that will automate the material selection process.

Materials and Process Selection: Review traditional methods and new developments. Learn how a new material or manufacturing process can offer new design opportunities.Novel Strategies for Materials and Process Selection: Using ‘material-selection software and charts’ as a way of putting material performance and cost into perspective. Extracting criteria for materials and process selection from design requirements.

The Concept of Optimal Selection: Maximizing performance and minimizing material cost or environmental impact by incorporating the concepts of cost, price and utility into the selection process. Optimal selection of material and shape: the interaction of material and shape in design.

Database design and quality assurance: Types and sources of data, the structure of engineering selection, principles for designing selection databases, data checking.

Material Property Evaluation: Looking at selected ranges of materials taken from the selection processes and implementing them into simulated digital systems to analyse their functionality.

Quality: Standards such as ROSH, EMC, ISO 10993 are just some of the compliances in place to control materials in industry. We are experienced in all areas, from automotive to medical products and can provide access to tens of thousands of materials.