Enhancing the perceived quality of a vehicle sliding door inner handle concept design

Abstract

Customers can always verbalize their feelings about a product, but engineers can only methodically improve what they measure in a robust and reliable manner. There is a need to convert customer needs into technical parameters. The aim of this study is to carefully examine statistical methodologies for product development in collaboration with perceived quality (PQ). This paper presents PQ activities from a customer-oriented approach to the final product through an automotive sliding inner door handle. The inner door handle is not just a functional part of opening the door; many engineering parameters should be considered for customer satisfaction. In this study, the team collected customer points of view, categorized customer expectations in the Kano model, and created a QFD table. In the phase of concept solution development, PQ factors are defined as a part of design input. Concept solutions are created with the help of the Taguchi orthogonal array and evaluated with the Pugh matrix. Our findings show that not only the shape of the component, but also its position, hold significance for the customer. The design was developed and verified accordingly.