Abstract: Aiming at the problem of incomplete causal analysis and difficulty in the determination of conflict area that are caused by the failure to express information related to time/sequence in the process of determining conflict area by using functional model in TRIZ, based on the research on the essence of the two types of functional models, a conflict area determination method for the comprehensive functional process model and functional relationship model was proposed. Firstly, the function structure of system was established and the process of flow conversion realized by each function element was analyzed.According to the difference between the input/output stream attributes and the expected attributes of the actual function unit, the problem function unit was determined. Then the function model was established according to the corresponding physical structure of the problemtic function element. The root cause related to the problem and the corresponding conflict area were delimited based on the function model. Finally, the TRIZ tool was used to solve the problem. This method was applied to analyze and solve the problems in the operation of automatic grain selling device. The results show that this method can more comprehensively analyze and determine the conflict areas related to the problems in the system because of the comprehensive consideration of the process of function realization and the interaction between components.
Key words: TRIZ; function relation model; conflict zone; function process model; automatic grain selling device