Autoclave Cure Machine Selection
For Autoclave Cure, aPriori selects the lowest-overhead, feasible machine. Overhead, here, is the sum of the machine properties Direct Overhead Rate and Indirect Overhead Rate.
A machine is considered feasible if both the following hold:
• Machine’s length can accommodate the length of the mold for the part. That is, the mold length (see
Tool Length, Width, and Area) must be no greater than 80% of the machine’s
Usable Length, in starting point VPEs. Administrators can customize this percentage with the cost model variable
autoclaveSizeCapacitySafetyFactor (0.8 in starting point VPEs).
• Machine’s diameter can accommodate the diagonal of the mold for the part. That is, the mold diagonal must be no greater than the machine’s
Usable Diameter. The mold diagonal is ((Tool Length
2) + (Tool Width
2))
0.5. See
Tool Length, Width, and Area.
aPriori selects only from preferred machines, if there is a feasible preferred machine and the cost model variable usePreferredMachines is set to true (the default in starting point VPEs). If there is no feasible preferred machine, or if the cost model variable usePreferredMachines is set to false, aPriori selects from all machines. A machine is preferred if the machine property isPreferred (typically displayed as Is Preferred) is true.