Catia Blogs

Dassault Updates 3DEXPERIENCE Portfolio with Release 2014x

February 6, 2014 By Barb Schmitz Leave a Comment

One of the CAD giants, Dassault Systemes, announces the latest release of its 3DEXPERIENCE platform’s on-premise and on-the-cloud portfolio of solutions. Release 2014x of the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, available to all customers on February 24, includes an on-premise portfolio of 41 industry solutions and their 183 processes, plus a dedicated cloud portfolio of 14 industry solutions, with more than 60 processes, appropriate for businesses of any size.

Included in this release is SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual, which was announced at this year’s SolidWorks World event. Reception for this new product among beta users has been positive, particularly for its collaboration features and social network-like interface.

“With SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual, we were able to do four process revisions by the time our competitors were only doing their secondary revision,” says William MacLeod, senior engineer, Kennedy Hygiene. “The key reason for that is the collaborative aspect of Mechanical Conceptual, which permitted our customers to log in, see real time updates of the process and share ideas with us through the blog.”

Connect instantly to collaborate with other SolidWorks Mechanical Conceptual users through chat, screen capture and on-screen annotation.

On-premise portfolio covers gamut of product development tasks

The 3DEXPERIENCE® Process Portfolio On Premise expands capabilities already available on the V6 portfolio and unifies the user experience for all processes and industries. Built to answer customer- and industry-specific needs for ease of use and lower training costs, the open architecture allows customization and the integration of customer data into a single environment. It provides a single source for truth by integrating all data required to create a process experience while eliminating costly IT operations, such as database replication.

A single, compass-like interface provides easy-to-use navigation, search, and collaboration in the 3DEXPERIENCE platform environment that is extensible to any discipline in the company – engineering, manufacturing, simulation, sales, marketing, finance, procurement, and management.

Cloud offerings offer users lower cost of ownership

The 3DEXPERIENCE® Process Portfolio On Cloud expands capabilities already available on the V6 portfolio and unifies the user experience for all Processes and Industries. Offered as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) on public cloud to provide increased flexibility and fast deployment, it includes services and support of the cloud provider in the price of the Processes, with Dassault Systèmes as the single point of contact.

The public cloud operates 24 hours per day, 7 days per week, 365 days per year, and includes maintenance, licensing and upgrades. Total Cost of Ownership is improved by reducing requirements for computing and storage, as well as facility and human resources costs, since hardware is no longer required.

A single, compass-like interface provides easy-to-use navigation, search, and collaboration in the 3DEXPERIENCE platform environment that is extensible to any discipline in the company. The on cloud process portfolio also includes the following out-of-the-box capabilities:

* 3DDashboard brings information from diverse sources into one fully customizable web page
* 3DSwym enables cross-discipline collaboration of communities of users from anywhere in the enterprise
* 3DPassport provides a single sign-on for every 3DEXPERIENCE application licensed by the user

A complete list of Release 2014x offers and operating conditions is available here.

Barb Schmitz

Michigan Autonomous Aerial Vehicle robots take flight

January 18, 2012 By Laura Carrabine Leave a Comment

Danny Ellis was first introduced to CAD in high school with a course in Autodesk Inventor. As he advanced into the engineering program at the University of Michigan, he was introduced to CATIA.

“In between my freshman and sophomore years, I became irritated at how cumbersome it was to rotate a model using a traditional mouse. I thought I could get a trackball mouse and program it so when I rotate the mouse it rotates the part on screen. That’s when I came across 3Dconnexion. I ordered their SpaceNavigator right away,” said Ellis.

In 2009 during his senior year, Ellis began researching an aerial robot competition. Five days later, he started the Michigan Autonomous Aerial Vehicles (MAAV) team with 15 members. Within one week, the team kicked off their first quadrotor design for the International Aerial Robotics Competition (IARC). At the end of the first year, MAAV successfully built two quadrotor vehicles capable of manual flight.

“The IARC challenge is to build a flying robot of any type you want. We chose a four-rotor helicopter that can fly through an unknown building completely on its own,” added Ellis. “There can be no communication with the device. The robot follows signs, must avoid detection from security cameras, locate a room, retrieve a flash drive, drop off the decoy, and get out in less than 10 minutes. No one has completed the mission yet, but we are one of the better teams competing. It’s the most challenging mission to date.”

When Ellis started the team, he wanted to get a 3Dconnexion 3D mouse for everyone. “It makes modeling CAD designs so much faster and easier,” said Ellis. IN addition, the team quickly realized trying to fly the quadrotor with a standard joystick didn’t mimic the movements very well and wasn’t intuitive enough for the user. A 3D mouse could mimic the exact movement of the robot. It was at this point the team decided to take matters into their own hands and control flight with a 3D mouse.

“We use the 3Dconnexion SDK to develop a driver to control the quadrotor with the SpaceExplorer and it quickly allowed us to control pitch and roll, zoom control height, and rotation control yaw,” noted Ellis. “In addition, The SpaceExplorer’s Intelligent Function Keys control other commands such as on/off and camera control.”

Today, Ellis is still the head of the MAAV team while also completing two masters in aerospace engineering and robotics. He continues to use CATIA for all of his designing both for the team and his class projects. He also works at a student lab training other students involved in competitions in CAD modeling and machining.

He uses the SpacePilot Pro. “A 3D mouse allows me to easily interact with the model while clicking and drawing in 3D at the same time,” he said.

3Dconnexion

www.3dconnexion.com

Ice Dream: Towing an iceberg for fresh water

January 10, 2012 By Laura Carrabine Leave a Comment

“With the world’s water resources projected to diminish by one third in the next two decades, providing pure water to an ever- increasing world population is vital,” Mougin explained. To Mougin and Mauviel, one solution would be to transport icebergs to areas that lack fresh water for drinking and even cooling purposes. The scientific challenges are impressive — capturing a large iceberg that can weigh up to 7 million tons, protecting it from melting while transporting it across the ocean, securing and optimizing the trajectory with respect to meteorological and oceanographic conditions, and breaking up the iceberg to turn it into drinking water.

Dassault Systèmes worked with Mougin and his team to simulate the iceberg’s trajectory and its evolution by taking into account data such as variations in ocean temperatures, wind force and direction, sea currents, and boat drag force. They inserted this data into a 3D model of the iceberg to simulate what would happen all along the voyage.

The critical challenge presented to Dassault Systèmes’ engineers was to demonstrate, using virtual technology, the technical feasibility of displacing the iceberg in a controlled manner while reducing its melting. The project, managed by Cédric Simard, Interactive Strategy & Marketing Project Director at Dassault Systèmes, involved a number of steps:

Model the iceberg with CATIA based on a cloud of points obtained by scanning a real iceberg with radar.
Calculate and simulate the way the iceberg would melt using CATIA Systems and SIMULIA.
Simulate the way the iceberg would melt if surrounded by a protective isothermal “skirt” imagined by Mougin to slow the melting process.
Calculate how much fuel the boats would consume depending on the winds and currents encountered along the way

Various scenarios were simulated, such as number of boats needed, different departure dates and climate conditions, and the behavior of the boats and iceberg in the event of a storm or turbulence. In addition to enabling the team to visualize these scenarios, the simulation also allowed the scientists to test how to deploy the isothermal skirt around the iceberg.

Dassault Systemes

www.3ds.com

New software slated to change the workplace

January 3, 2012 By Laura Carrabine Leave a Comment

CAD software vendors have touted product usability for a long time. However, they haven’t really delivered on that promise until recently. There were a few software debuts in 2011 that changed that premise. True user usability could lead to a broader CAD audience and a bigger market share.

The product development team at PTC came up with the idea of a creating single program that does everything versus offering diverse programs with no connectedness. The strategy addresses its customer base and the trend toward solid modeling for the masses. Creo 1.0 is the result of that concept. The software currently has nine applications including Creo Parametric, Direct, Illustrate, Schematics, View MCAD, View ECAD, Sketch, and Layout.

The company focused on a group of traditional user problems and applied a core of technologies against them, specific roles having options for modeling modes with the click of an app. Simplifying a process that has plagued engineers and designers for decades makes using the software and being productive all the difference. The Creo GUI is much cleaner than the Pro/E GUI. According to those who have used the new product, the GUI strategy is most evident in Creo Parametric and Creo Direct. PTC leveraged the best features from CoCreate and made it easier to use. The company added features to Creo Parametric that will make Pro/E seem like ancient technology. Creo proves that a feature can live in a history-based and history-free environment keeping the parametric relation to features within each if needed.

Another 2011 debut was SolidWorks 2012 that also sports new features to help a more diverse audience. The software has improvements in assembly and drawing capabilities, built-in simulation, design costing, routing, image and animation creation, and product data management. Dassault Systemes says SolidWorks 2012 will help automate design functions, change product development processes, and extend support for collaboration and connectivity. This technology could change how the software is marketed and sold. The product helps users streamline design processes by removing traditional steps.

Autodesk’s AutoCAD 2012 and Design Suite 2012 series are available in a range of offerings including web and mobile applications. Thus more users have access to the technology and can stay connected to their work no matter where they are. In addition, AutoCAD 2012 and Design Suite 201212 are directly connected to the free AutoCAD WS web and mobility application.

With CAD pretty much saturating the engineering and manufacturing arena, CAD vendors are realizing that pumping out a redressed version of what went out the door at the last launch is not going to work much longer. They have to offer tools that appeal to other audiences. We have seen that starting to happen in the retail, hobby, and jewelry industries where non-engineering types are using 3D programs to crank out new products.

PTC
www.ptc.com

Dassault Systemes
www.3ds.com

Autodesk
www.autodesk.com

Dassault Systèmes delivers new realistic simulation technology in Simulia’s Abaqus 6.11 release.

May 19, 2011 By Laura Carrabine Leave a Comment

Dassault Systèmes announced new nonlinear structural optimization, coupled multiphysics, and high-performance computing technology available in Abaqus 6.11.

With new capabilities and more than 100 customer-requested enhancements, Abaqus 6.11 delivers on SIMULIA’s strategic commitment to provide scalable, high-quality realistic simulation solutions. SIMULIA customers in a range of industries—including aerospace, automotive, consumer packaged goods, energy, and life sciences—are using Abaqus to explore the real-world physical behavior of products and materials, in order to improve performance, reliability, and safety, while reducing development time and costs.

The software marks the first release of the Abaqus Topology Optimization Module (ATOM). This add-on product enables users to perform topology and shape optimization for single parts and assemblies, while taking into account large deformation, material nonlinearity and contact.

The product also introduces a new electromagnetics solution technology to solve problems requiring time-harmonic eddy current analysis, such as the hardening of a bearing surface due to induction. In addition, this release provides a new smoothed particle hydrodynamics capability for modeling violent free-surface flows, such as fluid sloshing. Additionally, customers will benefit from support for graphics processing units (GPU).

Dassault Systemes

www.3ds.com

Baltic Yachts transforms business with Dassault Systèmes PLM solutions

March 31, 2011 By Laura Carrabine Leave a Comment

Dassault Systèmes announced that Baltic Yachts selected CATIA Marine solutions to create better boats, faster and more efficiently. Founded in 1973, Baltic Yachts is globally known for its pioneering custom yachts combining innovative materials and technologies with high quality craftsmanship.

With many of its projects increasing in size and complexity over the years, Baltic Yachts needed tighter control over its design and engineering process. After evaluating different options to replace their existing CAD system, Baltic Yachts selected CATIA from Dassault Systèmes as the solution to integrate the complete value chain, provide the flexibility needed for its collaborative design and engineering processes while supporting the company’s creativity and innovation with state-of-the-art modules and methodologies dedicated to the marine industry.

Built on an open architecture, CATIA for Marine solutions enable a seamless flow of information across all actors in the yacht building value chain, covering the three main disciplines – structure, systems, and interiors – on a single collaborative platform, while offering a unique integration of the marine process.

CATIA was implemented by RAND Finland, a consulting firm specialized in Dassault Systèmes PLM solutions and supported by Dassault Systèmes marine industry experts. Dassault Systèmes has a team dedicated to marine customers and recently launched an initiative in Jakobstad in Finland, where one of Baltic Yacht’s production plants is located, to support the local marine industry.

Baltic Yachts
www.balticyachts.fi