USING ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING TO DESIGN ADAPTIVE USER INTERFACES - LESSONS LEARNED FROM A DFAM PROCESS

The use of Additive Manufacturing (AM) is not limited to non-functional mock-ups, but can also serve to produce fully functional prototypes and end products. This paper outlines the development of a user-adaptive physical human-machine interface (HMI) to examine influencing factors of a Design for AM. For the development of the HMIs, an iterative design approach has been pursued using AM prototypes of shape-changing control elements in end user usability testing for the ergonomic development of the adaptive interface. With a systematic derivation of ergonomic and functional aspects, different shapes of the adaptive HMI are determined. Based on the compiled requirements of the user regarding the control element and the resulting requirements of using AM, four adaptive prototypes were developed. The prototypes are discussed and compared based on ergonomic, functional and manufacturing-related aspects and the conclusions of the process for designing the HMIs for AM are presented. Finally, statements are made concerning the findings for future development projects for AM and aspects that ought to be considered using AM for the design of physical human-machine interfaces.