Configuration Management for Innovative Hardware Product Development

There are many different views and questions in companies today about whether product Configuration Management (CM), tracking, and controlling the files and documents that define a physical product, is needed. Many companies also ask what is the best way to go about CM?  The answer to those questions is – it varies.  It varies based on the company’s capabilities, the products being designed and manufactured, the uses for these products, the end-users of the products, and a multitude of other factors. 

For example, if a company is making paper clips, they probably don’t have any end users who want to know if any changes are made to them over time.  But if a company is designing or manufacturing something in the medical, space, aircraft, automotive, and defense industries, the end user is very interested in what revisions of all parts go into their products or get revised. This is especially true if there have been any product failures.  Configuration Management gives a company a way to do that. 

In this article, we will share a description of the purpose of configuration management, requirements for a CM system, method of implementation variations based on company size and type of item requiring control, and some examples of how this might be implemented in different ways. Our focus will be on stakeholders who are not always involved in product development.  By the end, you should have a good feel of how to use configuration management to speed up and reduce the cost of bringing a new innovative product to market.

The Purpose of Configuration Management 

Put simply, Configuration Management is a system or process that maintains, tracks, and controls releases and changes to items over their lifetime.  It may be used to track an item’s requirements, physical attributes, design, performance, test records, etc.  It allows for the review and approval of initial releases of items and changes to released items before the changes are officially applied to them.  It also gives the ability to go back to previous revisions if needed.  Often the CM process is applied to items such as documents (SOW’s, requirements documents, reports, test plans and procedures, etc), CAD files (part, assembly, drawing, or STEP files provided to fabricators or customers, etc), Bills of Materials (BOM’s), analysis files and reports, software, etc. 

Most people who swear by configuration management brought a product to market without a CM system in place. And they paid the price in trying to get a handle on what they did, what was out there, and what changes were made. It seems like an unnecessary expense in the early stages of a product development project, but you will soon learn how important it is.

Benefits of Configuration Management 

Some of the benefits of using configuration management include the following: 

• Many types of items can be configuration controlled (CAD, documents, analysis files, etc) 
• Multiple discipline review of items prior to release or change 
• Changes are documented between revisions 
• Managed assemblies or software would have a known configuration for any revision 
• Allows for performing Physical Configuration Audits on hardware 
• Tracking of CAD file revisions that have been sent out for fabrication or to customers 
• Document what configuration of parts or assemblies were used in qualification testing 
• Previous software builds are available for testing and bug fixes 
• Ability to retrieve previous revisions of controlled items if needed 

Components of a Configuration System

Each configuration management system varies from application to application, but must contain the following components:

Configuration Controllable Data

Many different types of items can be configuration-controlled.  These can include:

• Documents or presentations
• Statements of Work (SOW’s)
• Requirements documents
• Reports
• Test plans and procedures
• Design reviews
• CAD files (part, assembly, drawing, or STEP or other neutral file format files provided to fabricators or customers, etc)
• Bills of Materials (BOM’s),
• Analysis files and reports, software, etc. 

File formats can include pdf’s, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, native or STEP, Parasolid, IGES, etc CAD files, text, or desired software files. 

Review and Signoff

The review and sign-off process prior to releases or changes lets multiple people and/or other disciplines review the items to make sure they work for all necessary groups/disciplines that use the item(s) or are involved in fabrication or manufacturing of them.  This allows multiple sets of eyes from different perspectives to review the changes and ensure they appear correct, to determine if there are any downstream effects of the changes and what they are, and to verify interchangeability between part/assembly revisions to ensure reidentification is not required. 

Reidentification is needed if a part or assembly is not form, fit, and function compatible with the current part or assembly.  If it isn’t form, fit, and function compatible, the item would require a new part number, and the assembly that it goes into would need either the BOM changed, or it would need to be reidentified also, or both, depending on the next higher assembly compatibility. 

Change Process

The change process should include documentation showing what has changed between revisions (sometimes called a FROM – TO redline document) as well as the reason(s) for the changes (often documented on an Engineering Change Order or ECO form).  This helps the Reviewers and Approvers in the change process as well as downstream users that might need to see details of what was changed and why in an earlier revision. 

Revision Control and Access

If a user or a customer needs to know what revision parts make up a known revision of an assembly, they would be able to determine that if the configuration is controlled.  This could be used in failure analysis, reviewing test results, verifying interchangeability, etc. (this may somewhat depend on the implementation of the CM process and the tools used for it) 

If customers, such as the NASA, the Department of Defense (DoD) or the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), require Physical Configuration Audits on hardware, the configuration management process can define all the revisions of all the parts used in a subassembly or assembly (this may also somewhat depend on the implementation of the CM process and the tools used for it). 

When suppliers send CAD or drawing files to fabricators or to customers, using configuration management they can send known and controlled revisions of CAD and/or drawing files.  Having a known and controlled revision keeps all parties on the same page by making sure that all distributed information is of the same revision. 

Integration with Test

When performing product qualification testing, it is imperative to know the configuration of the part or assembly being tested.  If there is a test failure or a product failure down the road, changes to the test item may be needed and re-testing may be required.  Once the necessary updates are determined and fabricated, the new revision of the item is then retested if required.  Test data records should record the revision of the item being tested for future reference. 

Connection to Parts in the Field

If a customer has a field failure of a previous revision item, CM allows the supplier to retrieve the revision that failed (since all revisions are maintained) and perform analysis or testing on it to determine if there was an issue with that revision.  Conversely, if a customer has a failure on a current revision of an item, configuration management allows the supplier to retrieve the previous revisions that were tested, and then analysis or testing can be performed and compare the old and current revisions. 

Description of Configuration Management Requirements 

Configuration Management can contain many different requirements and process steps depending on the process implemented, the CM tool used, and end-user needs.  Most processes will include at least some, if not all, of the following requirements: 

• Item revision tracking 
• Having “read only” files of all approved revisions 
• Properties of the controlled item (such as document, part, or drawing number, title, next higher assembly, etc.) 
• Reviewer/Approver evaluation and sign off for initial release and changes 
• Documentation of the reason(s) for change(s) between revisions 
• Documentation of what changes are made between revisions 
• Effectivity of the changes (dates or serial numbers as applicable) 
• Manufacturing or rework impacts 
• Class of the changes (form, fit, and function compatible or not; Class 1 changes are non-interchangeable while Class 2 changes are interchangeable) 

Small companies may not have purchased or developed a CM tool that they can use to release and track product changes if desired.  They may need to do a more manual method if they want to track changes and releases.  Methods of how to accomplish this are listed in the following section. 

Medium sized companies may have tools that work with their CAD system to control files and may be able to do some of the items listed above.  See the following section for examples. 

Larger companies with a history of needing configuration management, will probably use a purchased or developed CM software system (Agile, Windchill, VMware? etc) that can do most of, if not everything listed above. 

Methods and Examples of Implementations 

For smaller companies that may not have the means to purchase or create configuration management software, there are ways they can accomplish some of the desired requirements of CM.  This is usually a highly manual process, but it can be effective. 

An example of this would be: 

• Having a computer or server that has designated storage space for controlling desired files. 
• Only a few designated users (CM ”mangers”) should have Read and Write access to this storage area. 
• Anyone needing to retrieve information from this storage location to get a copy or to begin a change to the information, should be given Read access only. 
• A document is created to define what is being released or changed and all the desired information that goes along with this (part or document number(s), title(s), current revision(s), reason for change(s), what is changing {sometimes shown as a FROM-TO redline document}, rework instructions, effectivity, etc).  This is often called an Engineering Change Order (ECO).  It can be a Word, Excel, PDF, etc file that has all the desired fields for a user to enter the information needed. 
• The ECO and updated versions of the files to be released should be passed around for approval or updated if changes are needed after the review process.  If no configuration management software is being used, the files may need to have the revision in the title of the files so users can tell what file to retrieve later. 
• For assembly Bills of Material, these might be tables on the assembly drawings, or they could be a separate Excel file or something similar if that works with their purchasing system.  These would also need to have the revision in the title of the files so users can tell what file to retrieve later. 
• Once approved, all the associated files would be saved in the CM area that has permissions controlled. 

For a medium sized company that may have purchased a configuration management system for their CAD software (such as SolidWorks ePDM or something similar), the implementation could be slightly different but with several similarities.  This implementation could be something like this: 

• Having a computer or server that has designated storage space that the configuration management tool can be configured to control and that users can add files to and read files from this area. 
• There may be different privileges that would be assigned to administrators vs general users for the file storage area.  This would be configured during setup and as new users are added. 
• If the CM software tool doesn’t have a user interface to enter the information that is needed for releases and changes, an ECO form would also be needed here similar to that described above. 
• If the configuration management tool has a way to pass files around to desired reviewers, the manual process could be replaced with this method.  If not, a review process similar to that described above would be needed. 
• Assembly Bills of Materials would probably be similar to what is described above (on the drawing or a separate Excel file) 
• Once the review and approval process is complete, all files for the release or change would be revision controlled at the applicable revision.  All revisions of the CAD files and other files that are controlled should be available to users.  Non-CAD files may need to have the revisions in the file names similar to the above process. 

In larger companies that have purchased or created a configuration management tool, the steps may be a little different and it will depend on the CM tool used.  Most enterprise CM tools can automate some of the ECO form and BOM tasks to some extent. This implementation could be something like this: 

• The CM tool would need to be installed probably on a network server and may have an app that would be installed on a user’s local machine. 
• The CM tool will probably have a user interface that would allow the user to enter the information normally entered on an ECO form (Part/Drawing numbers, reason for change, effectivity, etc). 
• Depending on the CM tool chosen and if it is compatible with the CAD system, file management can be handled in a couple ways.  If the CM tool is compatible with, and understands how CAD files may be related, the user may be able to reference or attach the latest CAD model to the release or change. 
• If the CM tool is not compatible with the CAD system, users may need to attach STEP files as a reference for CAD changes.  This may also be necessary to send STEP files to fabricators as they may have a different CAD system than the user.  The CAD files would also need to be maintained in the CAD systems CM tool that does understand the interrelationships between CAD files.  The STEP files would be controlled by being attached to the change in the CM system. 
• The user may want to attach a From-To Redline drawing to show what the changes are to help reviewers. 
• BOM changes to assemblies may be made in the CM tool depending on the tool used.  These BOM changes may be able to give purchasing people what changes are needed directly to help with the ordering process. 
• Once a change or release package is ready, the approvers would be notified and they can go in and review everything associated with the change or release.  They can then approve it, or reject it and send comments and questions to the author to update. 
• After all approvers have all given approval, the change or release is finalized, and the information is considered released.  If the CAD tool is separate, the user or administrator would need to go into that tool and release the CAD files to the change or release revision level. 

Don’t Take Configuration Management for Granted, Make It Part of Your Product Development Process

The above information gives a description of the purposes and benefits of Configuration Management , a general description of CM requirements, along with a few examples of the way CM can be implemented in various-sized businesses.  Depending on the configuration management tools chosen and the business needs, process steps will vary for releases and changes, but the main purpose is the same for all – maintaining a record and control of all items requiring maintaining release and change history as the business requires. 

PADT is in the business of making innovation work, and that even includes making sure our own configuration management approach is working, integrating with customer configuration management systems, and helping new product development teams implement their own system.  If you have any questions or want to talk with PADT’s experts about your product development, simulation, or 3D Printing needs, reach out.