Conceptual design produces a number of functions the designed product
is to fulfill, several solution principles (means) for each function, and
multiple overall principle solutions (concepts). Besides concept
synthesis, it is important to determine the (few) early solution
properties that are of interest at the concept stage. Further activities
are assessing the consequences of the chosen means and their
instantiation, the effects of changes, and how decisions affect other
elements. Using a quantitative functional representation can facilitate
these tasks, but a balance is needed between product-dependent tools
predicting many detailed properties, and product-independent, generally
applicable tools with limited prediction capabilities. A balance between a
closed, general set of predefined building blocks and extensibility by
modeling application-specific, individual elements is also necessary. In
this paper, a generally applicable conceptual design model is presented,
which has been established by theoretical reasoning applied to a number of
products. These products were the subjects of previous company-ordered
student projects. The resulting information model spans continuously from
requirements to concepts and permits modeling desired functionality
(functions), achieved functionality (means and their value choices), and
explicit constraints (internal and external relations between parameters
of requirements, functions and means). To indicate the suitability in
principle, the model has been implemented in an interactive, incremental
prototype for computer support that permits modeling, storage, and reuse
in a database. It can be concluded that the model permits explicit
modeling of complex relations, automatic change propagation, and handling
of many concept alternatives. Integrated, bidirectional, and continuous
connections from requirements to concepts facilitate conceptual design,
reuse, documentation of the results, and allow changes to be made and
their effects assessed easily. Incremental constraint networks are
approved, for example, in configuration design or geometry modelers, and
the significance of this article is to enable their use also for
quantitative analysis of incomplete, evolving concepts in original design
tasks allowing different principle solutions, and for various products of
mechanical design.