Coupling simulations: A simple way to increase results accuracy

01/25/2012

Erwan BeauchesneSoftware Development Manager, Manufacturing Technology at Altair

Coupling simulations from different domains is becoming increasingly important, considering the evolution of CAE toward multi-physics problems. As an example, utilizing residual stress/strain as well as thinning information from metal-forming simulation is gaining rapid acceptance in the structural CAE community. Most of the time, components of full-car crash models are defined independently from any residual stresses and strains, and thicknesses are considered as nominal, whereas a lot of these ones have been manufactured thru stamping or bending processes.

To neglect these initial conditions leads to inaccurately capture the material response under structural loading, which is especially true with advanced high strength materials, which are gaining more usage for weight reduction.

Similar needs can be seen in a variety of other simulation domains. To transfer data between CFD and structural CAE is also realized in aircraft wing design process. CFD analysis is used to evaluate the wind pressure, which has to be passed on to the structural analysis model to evaluate stresses. However, the mesh for CFD and structural analysis are different so that it is necessary to map the data via interpolation between the two meshes. Similarly, in electronic cooling systems, heat transfer analysis often is followed by a structural analysis, which uses a different mesh, to evaluate distortions.

We are seeing a growing number of customers coupling their simulation results with structural CAE making the development of robust, efficient and accurate mapping tools very important.

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Tags: cfd++, crash, HyperCrash, HyperMesh, NVH
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