Robust target cascading for improving firing accuracy of combat vehicle.

Complex systems like combat vehicles contain numerous subsystems and components. Therefore, simultaneous consideration of hierarchy of a system, subsystems, and components is necessary for optimization. Multidisciplinary design optimization techniques have been researched to design the complex system. However most of these techniques premise integration process of total system which requires great time and cost. To reduce time and cost for the integration process, we introduce a target cascading technique that optimizes complex hierarchy system with several subproblems of each subsystem and component. Another challenge is to improve the firing accuracy of combat vehicle under various uncertainties. Robust design is therefore necessary to improve the firing accuracy of combat vehicles. To utilize these two concepts in optimization process, statistical information of firing angle is used as linking variables for problem formulation of robust target cascading. Furthermore, analysis of variance, surrogate modeling and statistical approach evaluating firing accuracy are employed to enhance efficiency of optimization. Finally, optimum design of a combat vehicle is achieved by using robust target cascading while improving firing accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]