An overview of Precision Engineering
Precision Engineering is a subdiscipline that focuses on designing machines and other structures that require exceptional low tolerance, are repeatable, and remain stable. It comes under software engineering, electrical engineering, optical engineering, electronics engineering, and mechanical engineering. These have applications in optoelectronics, machine tools, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), and nanoelectromechanical (NEMS).
Precision Engineering also means the discipline of designing a machine or instrument that follows a path many levels of magnitude smaller than the machine itself.
Purpose of Precision Engineering
The idea of precision engineering is to develop machines and work tools that follow a set of instructions with a high level of precision. The devices designed have no probabilistic and random behaviour allowing for a cause-and-effect relationship within our ability to understand and control.
Precision engineering has applications in machinery, and it has a significant presence in the manufacturing industry. The application of precision engineering has resulted in CNC Machinery and other products. It has revolutionized the manufacturing industry and is responsible for most of the world’s modern machinery.
Goals of Precision Engineering
Professors Hiromu Nakazawa and Pat McKeown laid down a list of goals for precision engineering, which are below:
Improving product performance by
- Creating an exact movement.
- Reducing the dispersion of the product’s or part’s function.
- Extending the lifespan of its parts
Improve manufacturing ability by
Reducing the initial cost
- Reducing the running cost
- Improving interchangeability of components so that parts of other companies can be used in their place
- Eliminating fitting and promoting automatic assembly
- Achieving greater miniaturization and packing densities
- Improving quality control via higher machine accuracy capabilities, hence reducing rework, scrap, and conventional inspection
- Making functions independent
- Lowering the design safety factor
- Achieving advances in technology and the underlying sciences
Impact of Precision Engineering
Precision engineering is so important because it has been the foundation of industrial technology over the past century. It has paved the way for revolutionary advances in many fields such as healthcare, the transport industry, and electrical engineering.
In healthcare, tools such as scalpels and others are manufactured with precision thanks to the machinery developed by precision engineering. Complicated surgeries can also be performed with the help of complex machines, which wouldn’t be possible without precision engineering. Such an example would be the use of laser technology in surgeries.
Transportation likes cars, planes, and ships have come a long way thanks to precision tools. These products can be manufactured on a large scale with minimal defects, making them safer. They have also remained at reasonable prices because of the ever improving technology that goes into making them.
Electrical engineering also has critical applications for precision tools. Products like smart watches, laptops, smartphones, tablets, and any electronic device can only be made with the help of precision engineering. The modern world as we see it today is possible mainly because of the impact of precision engineering. This kind of engineering has made possible the modern life we live today.
