Patent ID: 8219369

Claim:
A method of identifying joint locations for an assembly using individual electronic component part files in a computer-aided design system, the method comprising: determining, by the computer-aided design system, one or more overlap regions by identifying a first normal of a first face on a first component part of the assembly that is one of opposite to and parallel to a second normal of a second face on a second component part of the assembly and identifying that the first face is less than a specified gap distance from the second face using a first component part electronic file corresponding the first component part and a second component part electronic file corresponding the second component part; determining, by the computer-aided design system, a number of guide curves along each of the one or more the overlap regions based on whether a minimum width of each of the one or more the overlap regions exceeds a specified maximum value; and determining, by the computer-aided design system, one or more joint locations along the number of guide curves based upon one or more parameters.