Chartered Membership of IMechE (CEng MIMechE) Engineering Design, Development and Problem Solving Flashcards

24 sample cards from the Engineering Design, Development and Problem Solving deck

Sampled from the end of the deck, so these are different cards from the ones shown on the syllabus page.

1. Distinguish between incremental, radical, and disruptive innovation.

   Incremental innovation makes small improvements to existing products/processes. Radical innovation introduces a fundamentally new technology or capability. Disruptive innovation creates a simpler/cheaper offering that initially serves an overlooked market then displaces established ones.

2. What is the difference between an invention and an innovation?

   An invention is the creation of a new device, method or idea. Innovation is the successful exploitation of that invention to deliver value, i.e. bringing it into practical, commercial or beneficial use.

3. What is the 'fuzzy front end' of innovation?

   It is the early, ill-defined phase before formal product development where opportunities are identified, ideas generated and concepts explored. It is high in uncertainty but is where the greatest influence over eventual value and cost is exerted.

4. What is an innovation 'S-curve' and what does it depict?

   It plots a technology's performance against effort or time, showing slow initial progress, rapid growth, then maturity/plateau. It signals when a technology is approaching its limits and a new S-curve (technology) may be needed.

5. What is a stage-gate process in managing innovation/product development?

   It divides development into stages of work separated by decision gates where progress, risks and business case are reviewed and a go/kill/hold/recycle decision is made, controlling investment and filtering out weak projects early.

6. Name the four principal categories of formal intellectual property rights.

   Patents (inventions), Trade marks (brand identifiers), Registered designs (appearance), and Copyright (original creative/literary works). Trade secrets and unregistered design rights are also IP forms.

7. What three core criteria must an invention satisfy to be patentable?

   It must be novel (new, not previously disclosed), involve an inventive step (non-obvious to a skilled person), and be capable of industrial application (useful/manufacturable). It must also not fall within excluded categories.

8. Why is keeping an invention confidential before filing a patent critical?

   Because public disclosure before the filing date destroys novelty and can invalidate the patent. Prior disclosure means the invention is no longer 'new', so confidentiality (or an NDA) must be maintained until a priority filing is made.

9. What protection does a patent grant and for how long (typically)?

   A patent grants the owner the exclusive right to prevent others from making, using, selling or importing the invention, in exchange for public disclosure. Protection typically lasts up to 20 years from filing, subject to renewal fees.

10. Compare a patent with keeping a trade secret as exploitation strategies.

    A patent gives time-limited exclusive rights but requires full public disclosure and lapses after ~20 years. A trade secret can last indefinitely and needs no disclosure, but offers no protection if independently discovered or reverse-engineered, and relies on secrecy being maintained.

11. What is licensing as a route to IP exploitation?

    Licensing grants another party the right to use the IP (make/use/sell) in return for royalties or fees, while retaining ownership. It enables value capture without the licensor manufacturing or marketing the product itself.

12. What is 'freedom to operate' (FTO) and why must engineers check it?

    FTO is the ability to develop, make and sell a product without infringing the valid IP rights of others. Engineers must check it to avoid costly infringement litigation and to confirm the design can legally be commercialised.

13. Define whole-life (life-cycle) engineering thinking.

    It is the approach of considering all stages of a product's life - raw materials, manufacture, distribution, operation/use, maintenance, and end-of-life disposal/recycling - when making design decisions, optimising for total value, cost and impact rather than just initial performance.

14. What is whole-life cost (life-cycle cost) and what does it include?

    It is the total cost of a product or asset over its entire life: acquisition/capital cost (CAPEX) plus operating, maintenance, energy and downtime costs (OPEX), plus end-of-life disposal/decommissioning costs, often discounted to present value.

15. What is a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and what are its four phases per ISO 14040?

    LCA quantifies the environmental impacts of a product across its life. The four phases are: Goal & scope definition, Inventory analysis (LCI), Impact assessment (LCIA), and Interpretation.

16. What is embodied energy (and embodied carbon) of a product?

    Embodied energy is the total energy consumed to extract, process, manufacture and deliver a material or product; embodied carbon is the associated total greenhouse-gas emissions. Both are 'locked in' before the product is even used.

17. Explain the difference between a linear economy and a circular economy.

    A linear economy follows 'take-make-dispose', extracting resources, using them once and discarding them. A circular economy keeps materials and products in use through reuse, repair, remanufacture and recycling, designing out waste and regenerating resources.

18. State the waste hierarchy from most to least preferred option.

    Prevention (reduce), then Reuse, then Recycle, then Recovery (e.g. energy from waste), and finally Disposal (landfill) as the least preferred.

19. What is Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DFMA) and its main goal?

    DFMA is designing products to be easy and economical to manufacture and assemble - typically by reducing part count, simplifying assembly, and standardising components - so as to minimise cost, time and defects while maintaining function.

20. What is Design for X (DfX) and give three examples of the 'X'.

    DfX is a family of design guidelines that optimise a product for a particular life-cycle attribute. Examples include Design for Manufacture, Design for Assembly, Design for Maintainability, Design for Reliability, Design for Disassembly/Recycling, and Design for Cost.

21. Define reliability and the bathtub curve.

    Reliability is the probability that an item performs its required function without failure for a stated period under stated conditions. The bathtub curve plots failure rate over time, showing high early 'infant mortality' failures, a low constant 'useful life' rate, then rising 'wear-out' failures.

22. Define MTBF and MTTR, and how they combine into availability.

    MTBF is Mean Time Between Failures; MTTR is Mean Time To Repair. Availability is $$A = \frac{MTBF}{MTBF + MTTR}$$ representing the fraction of time the system is operational.

23. In whole-life thinking, what is the trade-off between CAPEX and OPEX?

    A lower initial capital cost (CAPEX) often increases running and maintenance costs (OPEX) over the asset's life, and vice versa. Whole-life thinking optimises the total of both rather than minimising one in isolation, since the cheapest to buy may be costliest to own.

24. Why does the early design stage have the greatest leverage over whole-life cost and impact?

    Because although early design consumes little expenditure, the decisions made there (concept, materials, architecture) commit the large majority - typically around 70-80% - of the total life-cycle cost and environmental impact, which become progressively harder and costlier to change later.

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