Before the detailed explanations are discussed on the abovementioned terminologies, the question can even be simplified to:
“Why do we use tools (or technology) in general”?
This is a question most people with and without a technical background and mindset will be able to answer. Although there will be different opinions and priorities, the most prominent responses will be “to reduce efforts”, “to save time” and even “to increase consistency”. There will always be a strive to save time and money while maintaining quality in order to be competitive and relevant in any business environment. Not to mention product development and sustainability. Mankind will always make use of available knowledge and suitable tools to survive, and in certain circumstances, to thrive.
If this reason is brought back to our original question(s), the answer and motivations may seem obvious as most engineers are talented in finding ways to do more work with less efforts. However, certain tools in the engineering industry not only help to accurately speed up repetitive tasks and calculations, but also help us to gain insights into the science and engineering involved in product design and development. The time saved on complicated, elaborate analyses while ensuring certainty on product performance and quality, is the powerful gear-ratio that defines the requirement for engineering tools such as simulation technology. Increasing the business potential (i.e. product or solutions output) for a fixed amount of time is the definition of profit efficiency, the primary reason why successful businesses simulate during the design and development stages.
USING THE CORRECT TOOL FOR THE JOB
A solution for a problem, or an outcome of an objective is measured on the final success as well as the performance thereof in terms of resources required. The solution or outcome, however, are very much dependent on the inputs and associated processes. The incentive for any successful engineer and business are to use the least amount of resources and time for the highest degree of outcomes.
It is without a doubt that industry challenges or real world problems are often far removed from the examples in textbooks used to explain the theory. There are many ways to address the challenge, both adequately and accurately. But more often that not, a certain amount of uncertainty goes with the solution as the methods have certain assumptions associated with it. Non-conventional characteristics in the form of geometry, materials and load cases are a few contributors to the uncertainty. The uncertainties are accounted for by margins like extra material or conservative load cases, which in turn again influence the precious time-money ecosystem. A successful engineer, or rather business, always use the best available engineering knowledge and tools to honour engineering principals and commercial or economic integrity.
Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) software and simulation technology are one of the primary tools engineers and manufacturers use today to achieve the sustainable dynamic between business sense and engineering certainty. CAE software assist engineers and manufacturers to characterise designs, products and processes in order to eliminate uncertainties, potential flaws and, importantly, where the engineering time spent on effortful manual calculations exceeds the value of the result. Simulation technology expands the capability of engineering businesses to ensure competitive knowledge is developed sustainably.
Introduce students and lecturers to CAE technology and its uses, benefits and limits. Explains where it fits into the lifecycle of engineering and how it is used to excel engineering businesses.
Powerful software tools to illustrate and define mechanisms, structures and mathematical modelling concepts and free body diagrams
Demonstrate the use of ML and AI in commercial packages.
CAE software to conceptualize, define and verify parts, assemblies and systems. Excellent use of technology to solve engineering problems.
Determine, explain and visualize stress and deflection of both both linear and nonlinear materials for static, quasi-static and dynamic analyses.
Explain, visualize, demonstrate and design components and systems based on flow and thermal behavior.
Design and verify parts, assemblies and systems with reduced costs and time to effectively compete in industry according to set specifications and requirements.
Helps students, lecturers and manufacturers to predict stresses, distortions and material states to understand and improve processes associated with specified manufacturing processes.
CAE software to conceptualize, define and verify parts, assemblies and systems. Excellent use of technology to solve engineering problems.
Understand different manufacturing processes and determine associated costs and time to optimize production, material usage and resources.
CAE technology are effectively used to predict process outcomes and the associated impact on time and costs.
CAE software to conceptualize, define and verify parts, assemblies and systems. Excellent use of technology to solve engineering problems.
Helps students, lecturers and manufacturers to predict stresses, distortions and material states to understand and improve processes associated with specified manufacturing processes.
Actran is used to perform acoustic simulations. It can be used to perform aero-acoustic analysis and can also be coupled with structures to perform vibro-acoustic analysis.
ADAMS is software to calculate the motion of moving parts as well as calculate the load transfer between parts. It is often used to determine the loads applied to different components in a complex mechanism. An example would be the modelling of a race-car driving around a race track: To calculate the behavior of the vehicle, the vehicle's mass and inertia, the suspension- and steering-components and characteristics, the track as well as the driver response is required in a single analysis.
scFLOW is a capable and highly-parallelizable CFD package for Aerodynamic models. It is especially good at modelling moving geometry, whether as rigid bodies or coupled to FEA models. scSTREAM uses a structured cartesian mesh for faster solving on specific types of models.
CivilFEM is a user-interface designed for Civil-, Structural- and Geotechnical-Engineering applications. It uses the Marc solver in the background, but talks the language of Civil Engineering and Civil Engineering codes of practice.
Digimat is a powerful platform to perform both micro- and macro-scale analyses of materials, predicting their performance and calculating their mechanical, thermal and electrical properties for metals, non-metals and composites.
Dytran is used to model short-duration events such as drop-tests and vehicle-crash simulations. It can model structures, fluids and fluid-structure interaction.
Easy5 is used to model and simulate systems and can be used to model control systems for them. The libraries allows simulation of systems that contains hydraulics, pneumatics, HVAC, Electrical systems and multi-phase flow.
Marc is the main nonlinear solver from MSC. It specializes in the most complex nonlinear analysis types and can perform structural, thermal, magnetic, electrical and acoustic simulations. It allows automated re-meshing for models where the mesh distorts too much. It can also perform fracture mechanics and use re-meshing to model the crack propagation process.
Material Center is used for Material Lifecycle Management. It is used to capture and manage material data with full traceability.
Moldex3D is used to simulate the complete injection molding process. It shows if and where any defects will occur and how the chosen material will behave during the whole process.
MSC Apex is the new CAE platform from Hexagon | MSC Software that consists of different modules and products for all future developments and integration of simulation tools. MSC Apex currently consists of 3 modules: MSC Apex Modeller, Structures and Generative Design.
MSC Nastran is an industry standard FEA solver in Aerospace and Automotive markets. It is a general Finite Element Analysis (FEA) code that can perform structural, acoustic and thermal analyses. It can perform linear and nonlinear analysis, but it is exceptional for large model linear static, normal modes and classical dynamic analysis (i.e. the Modal methods)
MSC One is a flexible license type that allows using almost all the software in the MSC Stable without having a separate license for each. It is the most cost-effective solution when more than a single piece of software is required to run.
Patran is a generic Pre- and Post-Processor mostly used for Nastran, but supporting additional products from MSC and other FEA suppliers.
SimManager is a Simulation Process and Data Management (SPDM) system that focus on meeting the needs specific to the simulation community.
MSC Apex Generative Design uses smart algorithms with built in manufacturing constraints to create optimized structures in seconds and minutes based on user design criteria.
Simufact Additive is a process simulation solution to manufacture metal 3D printed parts within quality standards the first time. Simufact eliminates unproductive, trial-and-error, development efforts by accurately predicting process results such as distortions, cracks and costs for Powder Bed Fusion (PBF) Binder Jetting (BJ) processes.
Sinda is a network-based thermal solver. It is used for space-thermal (i.e satellite) as well as aerospace and electronics industries.
CT quality inspection software VGSTUDIO MAX gives users the ability to keep the quality of their products high by giving them full insight into their products, from design to production.
VI Rail is used to simulate railway vehicles to determine features such as vehicle stability, derailment characteristics and track loading.
