Simulation Software

Altair Inspire and Altair 365 platforms for simulation-driven design

September 11, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Altair announced the release and immediate availability of the Altair Inspire simulation-driven design platform, and the Altair 365 cloud collaboration platform. The Altair Inspire platform enables manufacturers to leverage simulation to drive the entire design process, accelerating the pace of innovation and reducing time-to-market. This new platform brings together simulation solutions for generative design, engineering analysis, and manufacturability under a single, intuitive user environment, appealing to designers and engineers with little or no simulation experience.

“We believe the future of successful product development will rely upon an increasingly broad simulation user community,” says James R. Scapa, Founder, Chairman and CEO of Altair. “These new releases are part of a path toward simulation access for every designer and engineer at every phase of product development from concept to manufacturing to in-service operation.”

Together with the release of Altair Inspire, Altair also debuts its Altair 365 engineering collaboration platform on Microsoft Azure. Altair 365 allows customers the flexibility to access Altair Inspire and the entire solidThinking suite in the cloud under its new solidThinking units licensing model. Whether running on the desktop or on Altair 365, Altair Inspire customers will enjoy the same intuitive user experience and simulation capabilities. Altair 365 offers additional enterprise services including visual collaboration with peers, version control, secure data management and scalable high-performance computing resources.

“We are thrilled to introduce Altair Inspire and Altair 365,” says James Dagg, CTO at Altair. “This platform release vastly expands upon Inspire’s leading generative design and simulation capabilities to include manufacturing solutions for casting, metal forming, and extrusion processes with more to come in the future. Our goal is to make simulation-driven design a reality by continuing to place technology like Altair Inspire in the creative hands of all designers and engineers to drive innovation throughout the development process.”

Altair
www.altair.com/InspirePlatform

Altair introduces new licensing model for the solidThinking Software Suite

August 29, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Altair (Nasdaq: ALTR) announced a new software licensing model for its solidThinking suite of simulation-driven design software. Based off of Altair’s patented units-based licensing model popularized through Altair HyperWorks, solidThinking Units (sTUs) will share similar and distinct advantages enabling SMB customers and the design engineering community to drive product innovation with simulation. Under sTU licensing, customers will now have access to all software titles available through the solidThinking suite as well as the ability to seamlessly run these applications on-demand locally or in the cloud.

“We believe the frictionless access to our entire solidThinking suite and cloud resources through this single licensing model is a market first and compelling offering for SMB and some enterprise customers,” says James R. Scapa, Founder, Chairman and CEO of Altair. “The new licensing provides tremendous value and flexibility to organizations that are just beginning with simulation, have limited simulation resources, or require a comprehensive simulation solution that cost-effectively scales with growth.”

The Altair solidThinking suite packages a subset of software titles available through the broader Altair HyperWorks offering to rapidly explore, investigate and create structurally efficient, manufacturable product concepts and electromechanical systems. Inclusive of robust solutions for model-based development, generative design, hybrid concept modeling, multiphysics analysis, manufacturability, and photorealistic rendering, each delivers an intuitive user experience catering to the specialized needs of designers, design engineers, and manufacturing professionals with little or no experience with simulation.

Business advantages under the new sTUs licensing model include:

• Packaged for Broad Coverage, Priced for Value: Packaged as a comprehensive subset of applications available through the broader Altair HyperWorks suite, sTUs are less expensive than HWU’s and priced right for SMB customers.

• Access to entire solidThinking suite: Previously licensed as individual products, under the new sTU licensing, customers will be able to access to the entire solidThinking software suite. For example, customers with a single seat of Altair Inspire™ will now have access to nine (9) different software applications currently available through solidThinking.

• On-demand flexibility to run on the desktop or in the cloud: sTU licensing will soon provide the unique flexibility to run enabled solidThinking software applications locally or in the cloud from anywhere, at any time. This model lowers the barrier of entry for organizations with limited IT and compute resources to ramp up simulation-driven design capabilities. For those with a higher simulation maturity-level, the new licensing allows organizations to easily and cost-effectively scale resources to meet increased simulation demand.

The upgrade to sTU licensing has been designed to be straightforward and is available to all solidThinking customers by contacting their appropriate channel representative:

• solidThinking Lease Customers: seamless, no-cost upgrade to sTU licensing enables immediate access to all software titles in the solidThinking suite as well as the ability to run enabled applications in the cloud.

• solidThinking Paid-up Maintenance Customers: all legacy paid-up licenses will be converted to sTU licensing with all the benefits for the same cost currently paid for annual maintenance.

• solidThinking Paid-up Customers Out-of-Maintenance: regional incentive offers to upgrade to sTU licensing are available for a short time through the end of the year.

Altair
www.solidthinking.com/units

“Launching the Simulation Revolution”: Dimitri Mavris of Georgia Tech to keynote ASSESS 2018 Congress

August 29, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Bruce Jenkins | Ora Research

The ASSESS Initiative, says CEO and cofounder Joe Walsh, is “a broad-reaching multi-industry initiative to facilitate a revolution of enablement that will vastly increase the availability and effectiveness of engineering simulation.” Walsh and the Initiative just announced that Dimitri Mavris, S.P. Langley NIA Distinguished Regents Professor with the Georgia Institute of Technology, will keynote the ASSESS 2018 Congress, scheduled for October 28-30 in Braselton, GA. At the Congress—in our view, the single most important annual gathering of technology consumers and providers alike in the world of engineering modeling and simulation—Mavris will speak on “The Creation of a Digital Twin of the Georgia Tech Campus.”

“I am very pleased to be able to share information about the active project to build a systems-based digital twin of the Georgia Tech campus,” Mavris said, “and look forward to engaging discussions on future directions of systems modeling and digital twins.” Mavris is the Boeing Chaired Professor of Advanced Aerospace Systems Analysis in Georgia Tech’s School of Aerospace Engineering, Regents Professor, and Director of its Aerospace Systems Design Laboratory (ASDL).

In addition to being an S.P. Langley NIA Distinguished Professor, Mavris is also an AIAA Fellow and Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society, as well as a member of the ICAS Executive Committee, the AIAA Institute Development Committee, and the U.S. Air Force Scientific Advisory Board. He is also Director of the AIAA Technical, Aircraft and Atmospheric Systems Group. He holds a BS (1984), MS (1985) and PhD (1988) in aerospace engineering from Georgia Tech.

Focus: Integration of multidisciplinary physics-based modeling and simulation tools

For the past 25 years, Professor Mavris and ASDL have specialized in the integration of multidisciplinary physics-based modeling and simulation tools. ASDL’s signature methods streamline the process of integrating parametric simulation toolsets, according to Walsh, and enable huge run-time improvements that facilitate large-scale design space exploration and optimization under uncertainty. Recent research has focused on combining these methods with advances in computing to enable large-scale virtual experimentation in support of complex systems design.

“We are very honored and excited to have Dr. Mavris present at our Congress,” said Walsh. “Dr. Mavris and the ASDL at Georgia Tech have been a world-renowned driving force for the advancement of model-based systems engineering.”

ASSESS 2018 Congress

The ASSESS 2018 Congress is the third annual congress for ASSESS organized to “enable both strategies and relationships related to significantly increasing the use and benefit of engineering simulation,” Walsh explains. “Key business drivers are forcing a ‘simulation revolution’ to overcome the issue of required expertise which is limiting the expansion of engineering simulation usage. The theme of the ASSESS 2018 Congress is ‘Launching the Engineering Simulation Revolution.’

Registration for this exclusive, intimate, world-class event is by invitation only and is limited to 115 attendees. Registration will close either when all available seats are taken or no later than October 24, 2018.

ASSESS Initiative

The ASSESS Initiative was formed to bring together key players—both users and developers of simulation software—to guide and influence the software tool strategies for performing model-based analysis, simulation and systems engineering, with a vision “to significantly expand the use and benefit of software tools for model-based analysis, simulation, and systems engineering in the engineering applications domain.”

The ASSESS Initiative Membership program is a vehicle for the ASSESS Initiative to expand its efforts and community benefits beyond the annual Congress. “The ASSESS Membership Program is appropriate for all organizations engaged in analysis, simulation and systems engineering activities related to engineered products and processes,” says Walsh.

The ASSESS Membership Program offers both individual and group memberships. Active ASSESS Initiative Members receive access to members-only content on the ASSESS website and discounted ASSESS Congress registration fees.

ASSESS Initiative LLC was formed in 2016 “to bring together the key players to guide and influence the software development and implementation strategies related to model-based analysis, simulation and systems engineering, with the primary objective of expanding the use and business benefit of engineering simulation.”

ASSESS 2018 Congress

ASSESS Initiative overview

”What is the ASSESS Initiative and why is it important to end users?”

Altair democratizes simulation access for new-tech and emerging-markets entrepreneurs through Global Startup Program

August 21, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Bruce Jenkins | Ora Research

Altair on the last day of July announced immediate availability of its “simulation-driven innovation^”software to qualified startup companies through its newly formed Altair Startup Program. “Tailored specifically to the unique needs of the startup community,” the company says, “the global program offers preferential pricing for its simulation-driven design, computer-aided engineering, cloud computing and Internet of Things software solutions.

The program also provides no-cost expert consulting to quickly ramp up startup organizations with the industry’s leading multiphysics optimization platform, Altair HyperWorks, used by thousands of manufacturers worldwide.” For Altair IoT background, see our Altair acquires Carriots IoT platform in bid for IoT leadership in PLM, published in this blog last year.

“The startup community has always been at the forefront of innovation in new and high-growth markets of shared interest,” said Altair Corporate Marketing SVP Michael J. Kidder. “This program provides a powerful vehicle for Altair to connect more directly with hardware startups to help mitigate product performance and financial risks early, realize a successful exit, and cost-effectively scale for growth with Altair’s open-architecture simulation solutions.”

The program includes full-featured access to all Altair software titles, more than 150 Altair Partner Alliance software applications, instructor-led/online/self-paced training courses, expert consulting support and numerous co-marketing opportunities to build startup brand awareness.

“My business could not exist were it not for Altair, and our working relationship has been absolutely fantastic,” says Adam Wais, owner and startup cosfounder of Rolo Bikes. “We chose HyperWorks because it offers us the most powerful tools for our optimization and development tasks all within one suite. I’m not sure we’d have been able to take what we had to market without Altair.”

The Altair Startup Program is also available to, and can be customized for, business incubators and accelerators who are interested in expanding the resources available to support startup portfolios. Altair notes that SMB companies falling outside the Altair Startup Program qualification criteria may still apply for incentivized offers to get started with Altair solutions.

About Altair

Altair says its technology “transforms design and decision making by applying simulation, machine learning and optimization throughout product lifecycles. Our broad portfolio of simulation technology and patented units-based software licensing model enable Simulation-Driven Innovation for our customers.” With more than 2,000 employees, Altair is headquartered in Troy, Michigan, USA and operates 71 offices throughout 24 countries. Altair serves more than 5,000 customers across broad industry segments.

The Altair Partner Alliance (APA) gives customers access to a broad spectrum of complementary software products using their existing HyperWorks Units (HWUs) at no additional cost. They can download and use partner applications on-demand, just as with HyperWorks products. This constantly growing portfolio is intended to extend users’ analysis capabilities to help create better products faster.

Altair Startup Program

Altair HyperWorks

Altair Partner Alliance

Rolo Bikes

Optimization tool eliminates trial and error development

July 18, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Design optimization requires a lot of development time; with the traditional optimization process essentially coming down to trial and error. CORTIME offers a product that will help designers leave trial and error development behind by making automated optimizations.
CORTIME has powerful optimization algorithms coupled with an intuitive interface that minimizes the learning curve. By assigning variables and design goals, CORTIME uses the parameters of a CAD model to optimize designs. This process results in a large dataset from which the product developer can pick the preferred design.

Notes CEO Rasmus Høtoft, “I’ve been in too many design processes where it was too hard to figure out the optimal design approach. How will the different variables affect each other, how will the geometry behave or simply which of my concepts should I focus on optimizing? These questions lead to a trial and error approach which is limiting because it eats away my development time. This approach would therefore greatly benefit from being automated by optimization software.”

One of CORTIME’s clients BROEN – a leading manufacturer of valve technologies – currently use the software to optimize the weight of its valves.

Says R&D Engineer Morten Hansen, “CORTIME simply gives me a lot of data which I would have spent a long time acquiring manually. I can start CORTIME and return to the results later in the day. In that way I avoid human errors, get a better overview of the data and it gives me more time to focus on other tasks.”

Anybody with a SOLIDWORKS license can experience CORTIME by downloading the software at cortime.com

CORTIME
cortime.com

SIMSOLID Cloud: Breakthrough no-meshing, no-defeaturing structural analysis tool now available as an Onshape-enabled cloud application

July 5, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Bruce Jenkins | Ora Research

SIMSOLID, first rolled out in 2015, is a structural modeling and analysis software application that radically democratizes FEA by working directly on imported CAD geometry with no need for the two most time- and labor-intensive aspects of traditional structural analysis tools: CAD geometry simplification, or de-featuring, and finite-element mesh generation.

“Announcing SIMSOLID Cloud: Popular desktop structural analysis tool now available as an Onshape-embedded cloud application”

In February, SIMSOLID Corporation announced the general availability of SIMSOLID Cloud. SIMSOLID’s positioning of the product is that it “continues to set the standard for rapid simulation-driven design. Its innovative core technology eliminates geometry simplification and meshing, the two most time-consuming and expertise-extensive tasks done in traditional FEA. Moreover, SIMSOLID can analyze complex parts and large assemblies not practical with traditional FEA and provides performance feedback in seconds to minutes.” Our firsthand research among early adopters firmly confirms those claims.

SIMSOLID Cloud is an all new browser-based structural analysis application. Available in the Onshape App Store, it uses Onshape’s single sign-on and runs completely within an Onshape Document tab. With SIMSOLID Cloud, you never have to leave the familiar Onshape environment. All modeling, analysis and results visualization are completely embedded.

SIMSOLID Cloud offers structural static and modal vibration analyses. It comes with an integrated material properties library. Both individual parts and assemblies can be analyzed and parts can be either mesh or CAD solids based.

SIMSOLID Cloud comes with unique design study capabilities. Design studies are used to collect and quantify design performance variation. Each SIMSOLID project can contain multiple design studies and each study can contain multiple analyses. Best of all, SIMSOLID design studies are associative to Onshape geometry updates. As the geometry evolves, the study can be updated without having to recreate the existing analysis configuration settings.

“We are pleased to announce SIMSOLID Cloud,” said Ken Welch, co-founder and CEO. “Onshape is an ideal cloud partner for us. We are excited to get going.”

“SIMSOLID is an innovative partner,” said Jon Hirschtick, Onshape CEO. “Their meshless FEA approach is truly changing the way design analysis is performed. I think it is fantastic that Onshape users no longer have to simplify geometry before running analysis.”

No meshing, no defeaturing: SIMSOLID democratizes FEA

An Onshape model of a real-world, complex machined plate with 1200+ faces and 100+ small holes. It’s not practical to solve this with conventional FEA.

Introducing SIMSOLID, a Different Kind of FEA

SIMSOLID, an Onshape Partner, does not have the meshing limitations found in traditional FEA. It is based on new FEA technology that does not use a mesh, but instead applies classes of higher order functions on both a part and a CAD feature basis. SIMSOLID is an adaptive solver that automatically iterates to improve accuracy on both a local and global basis. Best of all, SIMSOLID algorithms are designed specifically to handle large assemblies with complex connections. Assemblies that are not possible to solve with traditional FEA can be quickly analyzed in SIMSOLID.

Simulation is typically used:

During the design process – to provide rapid design insight during product idealization and creation.
After the design is complete – to validate that the design specifications were met or not.
After the product ships – to diagnose product failures.

While structural simulation can be used in all phases of the product lifecycle, its largest benefit is obtained when used early in the design process before any hard manufacturing costs are committed. This is the ideal time to use SIMSOLID, which operates directly on Onshape CAD geometry without simplification. No meshing means that model setup is extremely fast and results are now obtained in seconds to minutes.

Robust, industrial-Grade Analysis Software

SIMSOLID is new technology, but it has been extensively tested and proven on real-world applications. It’s extremely easy to use, fast and accurate – and it can handle both large assemblies and complex, lattice-based, 3D-printed parts.

Here are a few examples:

SIMSOLID large model design studies (courtesy of Serapid)

SIMSOLID bone biomechanics analysis (courtesy of the University of Western Ontario)

SIMSOLID Cloud

MSC Apex Harris Hawk accelerates structural analysis for aerospace composites

June 26, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Bruce Jenkins | Ora Research

MSC Apex Harris Hawk is the eighth release of MSC Software’s revolutionary new CAE platform aimed at making sophisticated, full-powered structural modeling and analysis capabilities easily, intuitively and safely usable by engineers and designers without specialized CAE training and expertise. This newest release targets the need for accelerated structural analysis in aerospace engineering and manufacturing. For background, see our MSC Apex Grizzly: Structural analysis for massive assemblies and MSC Software democratizes vibrational analysis with MSC Apex Fossa, both published in this blog.

Aerospace vehicles are some of the most complex structures to design because of the high levels of physics and mathematics involved, MSC notes. “CAE has been a key driver for reducing cost and accelerating innovation,” the company observes, “but current processes still suffer workflow inefficiencies, and results often come too late in the design cycle—especially when designing composite structures.”

“Unique composite modeling and simulation experience that closely mimics the steps of the manufacturing process”

MSC Apex Harris Hawk delivers what the company describes as a “unique composite modeling and simulation experience that closely mimics the steps of the manufacturing process.” Instead of using finite element abstractions, MSC Apex lets engineers manipulate physical representations such as fabric, layups, plies, panels and zones. Within a few hours, the company reports, MSC Apex users can become efficient with composite modeling and on-the-fly failure calculation.

structural modeling and analysis — MSC Apex Harris Hawk model of a composite-layup airframe structure.

“MSC Apex gives EcoFlight the tools it needs to fulfill many of our aerospace and motorsport engineering analysis requirements,” says John Wighton, Director at EcoFlight, an Aspen, CO-based organization that uses small aircraft to educate and advocate for the protection of remaining wild lands and wildlife habitat. “The composite functionality in Apex Harris Hawk embeds methodology and capability, which greatly improved process efficiency. We couple the advanced composites capabilities of MSC Apex with MSC Nastran to give consulting clients a flexible and fast capability at a cost-effective price.”

Key new features

Modeling productivity—This release introduces a new geometry tool for surface extensions to eliminate manual rework and to allow engineers to automate model preparation tasks. Generative tie connections for assembly creation now takes minutes instead of hours, MSC says. Users can now create large assemblies of parts using mesh-dependent connections while preserving the product structure. MSC Apex Harris Hawk also features a high-performing hex meshing tool to help users mesh complex solid geometries.

Complete structural analysis—MSC Apex Harris Hawk expands its structural analysis capabilities with support for multi-events static analysis. Users can now manage multiple load cases. It also provides the ability to define pre-stiffening in the linear bucking scenario. The brand-new model browser-picking tool better supports result processing for model introspection.

Open and complementary—Beyond modeling productivity and structural analysis completeness, MSC Apex Harris Hawk continues to build on an open and interoperable framework through a full set of Python scripting APIs for conceptual modeling iterations, and interoperability with MSC Nastran-Patran including export of scenarios.

MSC Apex Harris Hawk

EcoFlight

Lensing 2020 and beyond: 8 megatrends in engineering modeling and simulation

June 21, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Bruce Jenkins | Ora Research

This second decade of the twenty-first century is witnessing an explosion of invention and innovation in digital engineering technologies unrivaled since the 1980s, when so many foundational tools and methods were either created or brought to practical fruition. Here are eight megatrends that we believe will drive generational leaps forward in engineering modeling and simulation technologies, methods and work processes through 2020 and well beyond:

Simulation-led, systems-driven product development.
Democratization of engineering modeling and simulation.
Simulation app revolution.
Design space exploration.
Topology, materials and process optimization for additive manufacturing.
Simulation for the Industrial IoT and Industry 4.0.
Big-data analytics in simulation.
Cloud HPC for simulation.

Already, each of these is today the focus of intense development by technology providers—and of investigation, investment and, in many cases, deployment by leading engineering organizations. Much of this work is succeeding in at last transforming long-established, powerful but formerly difficult-to-use, specialist-user-only tools into practical everyday engineering aids. And some of it—rather a lot, actually—is giving engineering organizations capabilities never before possible.

trends in engineering — Naisbitt’s 1972 classic of forecasting and futurology.

Enabling leaps forward are underway in both hardware and software architectures

Hardware—From on-premise to cloud:

Universally accessible.
Fosters infinitely elastic collaboration among users.
Commodity pricing (AWS, Azure, et al.) makes unprecedented computing power available to all.
Cloud HPC at last removing longstanding cost barriers to adequate CAE processing power.

Software—From SQL schema-on-write database architectures to NoSQL schema-on-read architectures:

Fast.
Scalable.
Designed to exploit cloud computing resources.
“Schema-on-read” allows data to be captured, stored and subsequently acted on with almost limitless freedom, without the application developer having to create a schema for the data in advance.
Two key benefits of schema-on-read:

o “Gives you massive flexibility over how the data can be consumed.”—Tom Deutsch, Solution CTO with IBM.

o And “your raw/atomic data can be stored for reference and consumption years into the future.”—Deutsch.

Leading NoSQL database MongoDB:

Powers eBay, FourSquare, LinkedIn and many other massively participatory sites.
In engineering, MongoDB is the database platform used by:
- Onshape.
- Frustum.
- More on the way.

Across the coming months and years we look forward to continuing our investigation and coverage of these and more step-change developments enabling and driving today’s and tomorrow’s revolution in engineering modeling and simulation.

MongoDB

Onshape blog

Frustum

Ora Research press: Background, examples, cases

Collaboration works to improve CAD simulation

February 21, 2018 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

SimScale GmbH (“SimScale”), a provider of the full-cloud engineering simulation platform, announced a collaboration with Siemens PLM Software and Tech Soft 3D to optimize the simulation workflow through better CAD model handling. SimScale will bring the benefits of Siemens’ Parasolid software and HOOPS Exchange to a browser-based CAE.

The latest release of SimScale, available shortly, will integrate Parasolid and HOOPS Exchange for a more convenient and seamless simulation workflow, while at the same time increasing simulation result accuracy—both in FEA and CFD.

“Our vision at SimScale is to enable every designer and engineer to take full advantage of engineering simulation—independent of budget, hardware and know-how. This includes seamless interoperability with the customer’s CAD system as well as fast, robust and accurate preparation of CAD data to achieve reliable simulation results quickly. Integrating Parasolid and HOOPS Exchange will help us achieve just that.” said David Heiny, CEO and co-founder of SimScale.

Parasolid is a 3D geometric modeling component for computer-aided design, manufacturing and engineering analysis (CAD/CAM/CAE) solutions, while HOOPS Exchange is a CAD translation software development kit (SDK).

“This latest implementation of Parasolid in a cloud-based application will enable engineers to simulate, test and modify 3D models using only a web browser,” says Jim Rusk, chief technology officer, Siemens PLM Software. “In selecting Parasolid, Simscale also obtains translation-free interoperability with hundreds of other applications that integrate Parasolid to design, edit and exchange high-precision 3D models based on the Parasolid XT data format.”

SimScale
www.simscale.com

Tech Soft 3D
www.techsoft3d.com

New EDEM/RecurDyn co-simulation solution gives off-highway equipment engineers high-fidelity modeling of bulk material behaviors

November 21, 2017 By Leslie Langnau Leave a Comment

Bruce Jenkins | Ora Research

Bulk-material simulation specialist EDEM released a co-simulation solution between its software and RecurDyn, the multibody dynamics modeling and simulation toolset from FunctionBay. This new integration enables engineers designing heavy equipment such as excavators, ploughs and off-road vehicles to introduce realistic bulk-material behaviors into their multibody dynamics simulations. EDEM says the new technology offers heretofore unrivaled insight into how material loads are transferred throughout the product’s structure and systems, and provides engineers with essential insights into equipment/material interactions.

Introducing EDEM high-fidelity load values into RecurDyn multibody dynamics simulations frees engineers from hand calculations and guesswork.

EDEM’s software models and simulates the behavior of a wide range of real-world bulk materials—from gravel, sand and rocks, to compressible soils, clays and highly cohesive ores, as well as powders. Users can select materials from a library of over 40,000 ready-to-use materials models, as well as create customized models to suit specific applications needs.

With an easy-to-use interface, highly optimized CPU and GPU solvers, and powerful analysis tools, EDEM delivers realistic predictions of material loads and forces acting on equipment parts during operation. During simulation, the new coupling transfers the realistic material loads from EDEM directly into RecurDyn, where they are used to calculate the effect on equipment dynamics. The updated dynamics are then passed back to EDEM to provide realistic force-feedback modeling throughout the simulation process.

“Engineers no longer have to rely on ‘rules of thumb’ and assumptions to get realistic material loads in their multibody dynamic simulations”

The ability to introduce high-fidelity load values into their RecurDyn multibody dynamics simulations frees engineers from having to rely on hand calculations—or engineering-intuition assumptions and guesswork—to represent equipment loads, resulting in greater design confidence. This also allows extensive what-if analysis to be performed without the need to build costly, time-consuming physical prototypes.

Engineers can also readily explore different product scenarios and easily compare designs across a range of various materials and equipment maneuvers early in the design cycle. This provides greater insight into equipment performance and enables more design optimization improvements to be made. It also gives confidence that equipment will perform as expected in specific conditions.

EDEM CEO Richard LaRoche commented, “When designing heavy equipment, being able to accurately predict the loads and forces acting on equipment is key to optimizing equipment performance and durability. By coupling EDEM with RecurDyn, engineers no longer have to rely on ‘rules of thumb’ and assumptions to get realistic material loads in their multibody dynamic simulations.”

FunctionBay CEO Michael Jang added, “Our partnership with EDEM means our RecurDyn users can get access to an accurate representation of the loads and forces acting on equipment. This capability brings greater insight into equipment performance and results in increased design accuracy and reduced prototyping costs.”

The EDEM-RecurDyn coupling is available as part of the recently released EDEM 2018 and RecurDyn V9R1.

EDEM

FunctionBay