SIEMENS

Many people have enjoyed the benefits of virtual product planning at one time or another — for instance when buying a custom-tailored kitchen. Whether on your own or in conjunction with a sales assistant, you can conjure up a model of the kitchen on a monitor and select the desired modules. Everything can then be revised with just a few clicks of the mouse.
The end result of such exercises is usually a static digital image. But suppose you could view the image from any desired angle, augment it with written or voice annotations, or even insert video clips — that’s the promise of 3D documentation and archiving.
"We expect this process to become standard for the development of complex products such as engines and medical equipment," says Sylvia Glas, an electrical engineer who heads a pilot project for multimedia applications in technical documentation at Siemens Corporate Technology (CT).
"The benefits of developing products in the virtual world are wide-ranging. "The most notable are that many processes are simplified, shortened, and made more cost-efficient," says Glas. In digital engineering the model data is available long before production of a prototype. This means that detailed brochures can be printed before there is a concrete object to photograph. What’s more, the product can also be depicted on a monitor so clearly that sales personnel can refer to a "look and feel" experience.
The pioneers in creating objects in the virtual world are the aerospace and automotive industries. In these sectors it is routine for models to be developed using computers and then tested in the virtual world before the first physical prototype is produced. This can dramatically reduce the cost of development — sometimes by as much as 50 %.
This exciting new world works only, however, with products that are designed, developed, and visualized using a computer right from the beginning. "That’s the only way to have full availability of all the data needed for a virtual model," says Glas.
For the CT pilot project, Glas’s team chose a new drive system from the Siemens Industry Sector’s Large Drives Division — the HT-direct motor, which works using a permanent magnet. The product was selected because all of its engineering data was already available in digital and 3D form.

Interactive Animation. Using this data, Glas’s team tested a range of potential programs to see which was best suited for generating virtual and spatial models. "Ultimately," says Glas, "We decided on 3D PDF from Adobe, because it is a free program within Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is standard on all office computers at Siemens." The reasoning was that no one wants to install a special program suitable for only one project.
Thanks to the CT team’s work, the HT-direct motor now exists as an interactive virtual model. It can be viewed from all sides on a monitor. And a 3D computer animation even illustrates how the motor is put together.
A generic tool, 3D documentation offers plenty of potential applications across a spectrum of fields. Take healthcare, for instance. Here, if doctors need to share a lung scan with colleagues or patients, the only way to do so today is to copy it to a CD and physically mail it. And recipients may still require a specialized program to view it, explains Sarah Witzig, project manager for Integrated Data Systems at Siemens Corporate Research (SCR) in Princeton, New Jersey. But if such a scan exists in a standard format such as 3D PDF from Adobe, it can be viewed on any computer, complete with annotations.

Replacing User Manuals with Images. Siemens’ new 3D documentation system offers a number of time-saving advantages. From a product life cycle management point of view, it offers the potential of accelerating development times, particularly when it comes to small-batch business, where start-up times and manufacturing runs are extremely short.
It also offers the huge potential advantage of sharply reducing written product descriptions, user instructions, and spare parts catalogues, thus significantly reducing translation costs. "Virtual models will greatly simplify things, not only by cutting costs but also by minimizing sources of error," says Glas.
Video-based user manuals for assembly work can be understood by skilled workers everywhere. Interactive training for assembly processes or for operational functions can be provided using few words and with minimal need for translation. Training content can be changed at every location and digitally updated to include the latest developments. Even a model’s inner workings can be easily displayed, for example by clicking a mouse to make the product’s shell transparent.
The new 3D documentation technology will also help to accelerate business interactions, whether it’s connecting product development with the production line, or marketing with sales, or ordering and billing with human resources. Before this can happen, however, standards will have to be agreed upon. "Right now, we are working on the tools for converting data from different systems into formats that are required for creating a 3D PDF in an automated fashion," says Witzig.
One format that will be supported by this process is the JT data format, which has become established as today’s standard format for visualization and exchange of 3D data. It will soon make cooperation between communication partners much easier. The JT data format is a technology from Siemens PLM software, which is used by Siemens itself as well as by many automotive industry companies. As in the real world, the virtual world consists of many small jigsaw pieces that slowly come together to form a complete picture.