Research On Usability Of Numerical Control Lathe

Recently, numerical control (NC) machine tools replacing traditional machine tools,have become the mainstream product of equipment manufacturing industry. The emergenceof NC machine tools reduces the human labor intensity and increases the efficiency, but thehuman-machine interaction and process control become more complicated. Therefore, theresearch of usability of NC machine tools has important realistic meaning to make user’soperation more comfortable, efficient and safe. Focusing on the usability evaluation anddesign of NC lathe, this thesis conducts the research on evaluation methods, affecting factorsand evaluation system from theory and method, testing and evaluation, design improvement.Based on the summary and analysis of the relevant theory and methods of usability, theresearch confirms the usability attributes and elements of NC machine tools; extracts theassessment index and methods which are applicable for NC machine tools; and thenconstructs a influencing factors model of usability based on the analysis and supplement offactors which influences the usability of NC machine tools, so as to lay the foundation ofusability testing and evaluation.According to the usability testing of the whole operational process and the control panelwhich is carried out by using observation, performance measurement and action analysis, aswell as the user satisfaction research, this thesis collects the expected performance data, inorder to provide the basis for usability evaluation.Analyzes the test data through adopting traditional statistics method and Captiv L7000behavior analysis system, evaluates the usability of three typical NC lathes and two controlpanels according to comparison assessment of quantitative data, summarizes the usabilityproblems during the operational process according to the analysis results of qualitative dataand user satisfaction questionnaire; and then designs a usability evaluation system of NC lathe,so as to provide method for usability evaluation.Aimed at the usability problems founded in the test, such as the poor functional area ofkeys, unreasonable interface layout of software and so on, based on ergonomics and designpsychology, this thesis summarizes several usability design principles of NC lathe’shuman-machine interface; then through a design example, this thesis improves the design ofNC lathe’s control panel and software interface.