Ethical issues in engineering design - 3TU.Centre for Ethics and ...

Design of a lightweight trailer
engineers, they should always ask whether a customer knows about problems
with the production or use of their products. Sometimes the CLC engineers will
have more experience with a product because of having made previous designs
for similar products. In these cases the engineers mention problems
encountered in earlier design projects. However, the customer is responsible for
the requirements and should indicate what problems might arise in use and
misuse situations. In this case-study, the customer had indicated that
overloading might occur but he never changed the requirements. The engineers
thought that changing the requirements to include overloading was the
customer’s responsibility. The engineers did not know whether overloading
caused problems for the customer. So although overloading was mentioned on
occasions, the requirements were not changed because the engineers expected
the customer to change the requirements if necessary. The customer did not
change the requirements to include overloading because he preferred to test a
prototype to breaking point.
The engineers would only incorporate the legal requirements on traffic safety in
a further phase of the design process. The customer thought that the sides
needed to be covered and that underrun protection needed to be installed. The
reasons he gave were that he thought that this would look good and that traffic
safety was a good marketing tool. Because the customer considered the side
covers to be part of the image of the trailer and not part of the structure he did
not include this in the list of requirements, nor was it part of his negotiations
with the engineers. He asked the engineers to make a reliable structure and
considered that the image of the trailer was quite another issue that he would
deal with after a structural design had been obtained. 10
The engineers did not think that they were responsible for traffic safety, they
deemed themselves only responsible for designing a manoeuvrable, and in
normal use, structurally reliable trailer. They thought that the customer was
responsible for providing the relevant information on experiences from practice.
According to the engineers, the government is responsible for traffic safety and
should provide adequate regulation for traffic safety. The driver of a truck and
trailer combinations has the responsibility to drive with care. Although the
customer thought that traffic safety was important he did not require the
engineers to consider it because he saw it as something completely separate
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10 Note that a lightweight trailer was intended and that adding covers onto a structurally reliable
trailer adds material and mass that is not used to support loads. Usually in lightweight design
engineers try to prevent the use of extra materials in places where they do not bear loads or
where there is already enough material to support the loads.
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