To relate technology development efficiently to new products and prevent quality problems before they arise, it is important to deal at an early stage with the long-term maintainability of systems that can give rise to quality deterioration and move smoothly from there into product design. This study concerns the development of system cleaning technology for an image-forming device. We focused on abnormalities（defects）in the surface to be cleaned, since they have had a major impact on the maintenance performance of existing products. By combining three-dimensional data and analyzing the causes of surface degradation, we arrived at a proposal for functional evaluation through vizualization and quantification, and constructed a rational design process that predicted the maintainability of system technology.

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