ABSTRACT
Computer-aided process planning (CAPP) plays a very significant role in the integration of computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) systems. However, even with advances in manufacturing and automation, the seamless integration is still not possible due to improper flow of information between the CAD and CAM systems. Moreover, the CAD system includes geometric information of a part, which are not compatible for the downstream applications such as process planning and inspection. The different CAD or geometric modeling packages store the design information in their own propriety formats [1]. The structures of these databases are different from each other. According to Yakup Yildiz [2], an intelligent interface between CAD and CAPP systems is essential to carry out precise process planning. This is due to the fact that the working of CAPP system, to a very large extent, relies on the accurate data derived from CAD systems. Therefore, the feature recognition techniques provide such an intelligent link between CAD and
CAPP systems. The establishment of such a link is not easy because the functioning of CAD and CAPP systems is based on different databases. The CAD database is geometry-based, which consists of entities such as points, lines, and arc, while CAPP systems are based on features including faces, cylinders, grooves, and pockets. To overcome such an obstacle, the concept of automatic feature extraction (AFE) technique was introduced. There have been many techniques, including graph-based and hint-based, such as cell division, cavity volume, convex hull, and lamina slicing, that can be used in AFE.
