Tips & Tricks

How do I create an SEA cavity using shrinkwrap?

How to create FE acoustic cavities with complex shapes

Auto Empty Folders option in CFD-GEOM

When importing large models into CFD-GEOM, you may notice that certain entities listed in the Model Manager may have a red box around them.

Adding Baffles to an Unstructured domain in CFD-GEOM

While meshing the geometries of industrial significance like mixing tanks, reactor and heat exchangers, we may encounter baffles which have negligible thickness but significant area to impact the physics of the problem in terms of momentum and heat transfer. These surfaces may be free-standing or connected to other surfaces from the domain.

Using Region sources in CFD-VisCART

In order to control grid spacing at user-defined locations, mesh sources are a common tool in CFD-VisCART (Figure 1). Point, Line, Curve, Plane, Box and Surface sources have been available for several years. Cylinder and Sphere sources were introduced a few years back. To extend this tool set further, CFD-VisCART V2013.0 introduced Region sources.

New Mesh Sources in CFD-GEOM for Triangle and Tetrahedral meshing

Corner Point Sources, Surface Interior Sources and Tet Sources have been available in CFD-GEOM for several years, allowing for refinements during certain phases of mesh generation.

Automatic covering of larger unwanted holes in CFD-VisCART

CFD-VisCART meshing automatically closes or covers holes in the geometry that are smaller in size than the cell size specified at the surfaces. To cover LARGER holes, the ‘Max Hole Size to Cover’ feature can be used. This feature, introduced in V2013.2, works to automatically cover larger holes in the geometry during mesh generation, and thus prevents the mesh from leaking into unwanted regions. This feature is available with all mesh types supported in CFD-VisCART.

Process optimization: the future of numerical simulation software

Optimization is becoming a very popular word. However, what does it mean and what does it involve? The goal of this e-tip is to give some keys about optimization concepts and its use in process optimization. In a first stage, we will describe the type of optimization problems that could be solved and in a second stage, the principles and algorithms will be presented. Finally, advantages and drawbacks of the different methods and algorithms will be addressed, with respect to the different types of optimization problems which can be solved.

Casting simulation: from prototype to performance

Passenger safety in cars, planes and other transportation vehicles is an ethical obligation, a legal issue and a technological challenge. Simulation is a well implemented tool in order to test the behaviour of a car body during crash. The models, including rapid deformation and rupture, are sophisticated and reliable. Currently, most properties used in such simulations correspond to homogenous and defect free materials. However, cars are manufactured before being crashed. And manufacturing routes such as casting, but also stamping, forging or welding, do not provide defect free and homogeneous materials.

Parallel processing

“To pull a bigger wagon, it is easier to add more horses than to grow a gigantic horse.” This paraphrased quotation nicely expresses the basic concept of parallel processing. The speed of sequential computers has been doubling every eighteen months, according to Moore’s law. However, at any given time, that speed is limited by the state of the art in integrated circuit design and manufacturing. To circumvent that limitation, it is possible to split a given computationally intensive task among multiple processors working simultaneously.

Critical issues in modelling investment casting

Reduce part development lead-times by a better knowledge of process and an early confi rmation of metallurgical capabilities is one of the main topics for investment casting technology. Numerical simulation is one of the major tools which can be used to face this goal. This e-tip illustrates a simulation methodology usable to optimize a casting design in an effi cient and rapid way.