Key Takeaways

1. Cloud-native simulation is leading the “new world” of engineering simulation by eliminating inefficiencies.
2. Purchasing and deploying your simulation tool has never been easier thanks to cloud-native simulation’s accessibility and immediate availability.
3. The cloud-native world enables customizable, online, and on-demand training for new users.
4. No restrictions on who can simulate – SimScale enables the democratization of simulation access, leading to a more diverse, efficient, and enriched design process.
5. In cloud-native simulation, the audit process is streamlined, with a transparent and easily accessible record of who took what action and when.

New World vs Old World: Redefining Efficiency

In contrast to the limitations of the past, cloud-native simulation like SimScale empowers engineers to innovate faster and navigate a streamlined and collaborative engineering design space. One way of looking at this is considering the analogy of a gardening hose.

A twisted hose hampers the flow of water and represents the inefficiencies of the “old world” of simulation. Even when this is untangled, a new kink will appear elsewhere, and without transparency, it’s hard to find where this inefficiency is. The free-flowing spray gun represents the “new world” of simulation, where the inefficiencies are gone, and the flow of water is not only streamlined but also in control, illustrating how cloud-native simulation can increase both efficiency and innovation.

In this article, I will show you how replacing legacy simulation tools with state-of-the-art, cloud-native simulation can streamline your team’s ability to design, innovate, and analyze more efficiently and effectively. You can also see a tabulated comparison at the end of the article.

1. Streamlining Purchasing and Deployment

The process of purchasing engineering simulation tools used to be characterized by long and protracted cycles, creating a considerable delay in acquiring the necessary design insight tools. Conversely, the cloud-native world introduces a revolutionary approach, offering affordability and immediate availability at no cost to kickstart your simulation work. This transformation in the purchasing landscape signifies a shift towards efficiency and accessibility.

Similarly, deployment used to suffer from sluggishness and installation bottlenecks with traditional, on-premise simulation tools. However, the cloud-native world presents a paradigm shift with instant deployment that negates the need for time-consuming installations.

Administrators can still wield control over access, immediately making resources available to anyone, on demand. Users can log in instantly, expediting the onboarding process, and the addition of a new user is streamlined to a simple task of entering their email address.

2. Facilitating Early Simulation Usage

Turning our attention to training and early usage, the old world demands large-scale organization for training sessions, often leading to unapproved training and the looming risk of new users making critical mistakes. On the contrary, the cloud-native world has ushered in an era of online and on-demand training, offering a flexible and customizable approach that can be seamlessly integrated into an organization. Support is not a distant concept; it’s ‘live’ and readily available when users need assistance. Time to answer is no longer measured in days or weeks but in minutes and seconds.

At SimScale, for example, the support system consists of real engineers collaborating with your team in real time, lessening the reliance on automated solutions.

3. Fostering Established Simulation Usage

Legacy simulation tools are fundamentally limited to disconnected, siloed teams, isolated projects on local machines, and data that is hidden and individually owned. Peer-to-peer learning is constrained by individual availability, restricting its effectiveness. However, once a company is fully up and running with its new, cloud-native simulation tool, the collaboration between connected teams is by default fostered, and projects are easily shared with all interested parties at the click of a button. Even in cases where projects require restricted access, there’s an option to form private teams. Administrators retain full access, eliminating the risk of valuable data being lost on a hard drive. Users can support each other within projects, and experts can offer guidance seamlessly within the validation process.

The philosophy of not restricting who can simulate is a cornerstone of the cloud-native world. By front-loading simulations early in the design process, SimScale enables everyone to experiment and learn at the initial stages, producing better designs faster than was previously possible. The democratization of simulation access ensures that input is solicited from everyone, leading to a more diverse and enriched ideation process. Templates, pre-defined by seasoned simulation engineers or SimScale’s own, can further empower new users to contribute meaningfully and confidently, knowing they are working within controlled guard rails. This inclusivity means that, with the support and guidance of experts, everyone can engage in hands-on learning and experimentation.

The transparent usage model in the cloud-native world stands in stark contrast to the old world’s opaqueness. License utilization is crystal clear, providing organizations with the ability to discern their actual needs and optimize costs accordingly. Nobody wants to pay for things they aren’t using, nor should they.

Users’ skill levels are transparently visible, facilitating timely support interventions before errors are made or time is wasted. Simulations linked to real-world projects offer insights into the value they added, allowing organizations to evaluate their tools’ and teams’ effectiveness and identify areas for improvement in subsequent design cycles.

The integration of simulation into the design and approval processes represents a significant departure from the old world’s compartmentalization. With legacy tools, simulation sits outside the process, creating a sequential flow from CAD, through simulatable CAD to results, and finally back to PLM. As a result, design reviews and approvals rely on individual simulation engineers for preparation, limiting access to crucial data. The cloud-native world, on the other hand, seamlessly brings simulation into the design process, allowing anyone to interact organically with insightful results.

4. Efficient Approvals and Audits

In the sphere of audits, legacy simulation tools grapple with questions of who did what and when and the whereabouts of critical data. This often results in team-specific tracking methods that lack standardization across the organization. In the cloud-native world, the audit process is streamlined, with a transparent and easily accessible record of who took what action and when. All data is stored in the cloud, providing flexibility in the organization based on organizational preferences.

The ability to link results from a PLM system with a URL ensures traceability, and the locking of results maintains data integrity and contributes to a comprehensive audit trail. Consistent and easily reproducible reports for each simulation speed up the time taken to interpret results and make approvals far simpler.

Summary

Join the New World with Cloud-Native Simulation

As we navigate the evolving landscape of technological advancements, the cloud-native world’s approach to holistically improving every step, from purchasing a design tool to comprehensive design audits, exemplifies a commitment to efficiency, transparency, and collaborative innovation. This transformative shift promises not only streamlined processes but also a paradigm where technology empowers users across all levels to contribute meaningfully and shape the future of their organizations.

With cloud-native simulation, blockages are removed, and the gardening hose is transformed into a powerful and efficient free-flowing spray gun. By dismantling the barriers of the old world, organizations can leverage the full potential of simulation throughout the product development lifecycle. Cloud-native simulation is not merely a technological advancement; it’s a catalyst for innovation, empowering engineers to explore, experiment, and ultimately, revolutionize product development processes. Get in touch with us below for more information on how SimScale can help you integrate cloud-native simulation into your workflow.

The post Redefining Engineering Efficiency with Cloud-Native Simulation appeared first on SimScale.

In this product update, let’s dive into the latest pivotal features introduced by SimScale in the third quarter of 2023.

1. Temperature-dependent material properties for CHT v2.0 & IBM
2. Humidity Sources Modeling
3. Visualization/Computation of Local Mean Radiant Temperature (MRT) Without Solar Load
4. Parametric Mesh Study on IBM Mesh Fineness
5. Multiphase/Subsonic Features
   • Non-Newtonian Fluids Available
   • Time-Dependent Boundary Conditions
   • Probe Points as Result Controls
6. Rotating Machinery – Blade-to-blade Flow Visualization
7. Automated Sweep Meshing for Structural Analyses
8. Orthotropic linear mechanical material properties in the cartesian coordinate system
9. Modal-Based Harmonics
   • Automatically Capture Resonant Response in Modal-based Harmonic Analysis
10. Yeoh Hyperelastic Model
11. Ogden Hyperelastic Model
12. Select Similar Shapes

1. Temperature-dependent material properties for CHT v2.0 & IBM

CHTv2/IBM simulations now allow for the definition of more advanced fluid properties through temperature-dependent tables:

• Specific heat
• Dynamic viscosity
• Kinematic viscosity
• Prandtl number
• Density

This means that our users can more accurately model specific material properties.

2. Humidity Sources Modeling

3D humidity sources are now available as a new advanced concept for humidity modeling. Attention has been paid to the robustness and stability of simulations in the presence of humidity sources. They can be used to model humidifiers.

The specification of the humidity type for fixed value boundary conditions has been added. The possibility of modeling a humidity source on a wall is also included.

3. Visualization/Computation of Local Mean Radiant Temperature (MRT) Without Solar Load

CHTv2 simulations now allow the calculation of the Mean Radiant Temperature field on fluids. This field indicates the temperature due to radiation heat transfer at a given point and can help quantify the radiant heat exchange between a person and their surroundings.

4. Parametric Mesh Study on IBM Mesh Fineness

The automatic mesh fineness slider in IBM (Immersed Boundary Method) now supports parametric runs, allowing for parallelized mesh independence studies.

5. Multiphase/Subsonic Features

5.1. Non-Newtonian Fluids Available

Our users can now model non-Newtonian fluid behavior in the Subsonic solver using the Herschel-Bulkley model.

This captures the correct physics of highly viscous, non-Newtonian fluids like motor oil and blood, combined with advanced CFD capabilities like multiphase and cavitation.

5.2. Time-Dependent Boundary Conditions

Time-dependent boundary conditions for most variables are available for transient analyses in Subsonic. Users may specify Velocity, Flow rates, Pressure, and Temperature at inlets and some outlets as functions of time in the form of a table input.

5.3. Probe Points as Result Controls

Probe points for Subsonic analyses are now available under the Result Controls. The number of parameters written out will vary depending on the type of simulation chosen.

6. Rotating Machinery – Blade-to-blade Flow Visualization

The newly released feature is a post-processing filter called “Rotational” that allows users to analyze flow through a cascade of blades. Mesh, flow vectors, and contours can be visualized on a 2D unwrapped plane of the blades, and the images can be exported.

This feature is currently available for centrifugal-type turbomachines. We will soon be releasing cascade views for axial impellers as well as meridional cut plane visualization.

7. Automated Sweep Meshing for Structural Analyses

Enable the toggle to automatically mesh bodies with continuous cross-sections using prismatic elements.

Prismatic elements such as hexahedral and wedge elements outshine standard tetrahedral elements in terms of accuracy and performance. With this feature, users can automatically benefit from swept meshes without the need for manual refinement.

8. Orthotropic linear mechanical material properties in the cartesian coordinate system

Our users now have the ability to create solid materials with orthotropic linear elastic behavior in which Young’s modulus, Shear modulus, and Poisson’s ratio are defined independently for the three mutually perpendicular cartesian directions. This allows for simple modeling of PCBs and composite structures in which material orthotropy can significantly influence peak stresses and deformations.

9. Modal-Based Harmonics

Supercharge your vibration analysis with Modal-based Harmonic analysis. This feature allows for efficient computation of many excitation frequencies, even for large mesh sizes! The new analysis method combines frequency and harmonic analysis into a single analysis, streamlining workflows and enabling users to automatically capture resonant behavior.

9.1. Automatically Capture Resonant Response in Modal-based Harmonic Analysis

Frequency responses of vibrating systems can now be resolved at high resolution using two new automation options for setting excitation frequencies in Modal-based Harmonic analysis:

• Cluster around modes: Harmonic loads are applied at frequencies clustered around eigenfrequencies.
• Cover spectrum: Harmonic loads are applied at frequencies clustered around and in between eigenfrequencies to fully capture the entire spectrum.

These options provide a super simple and automated process for capturing resonant behavior, accurately allowing users to confidently check peak values such as maximum deflection, acceleration, and stress.

10. Yeoh Hyperelastic Model

A powerful and user-friendly Hyperelastic model, Yeoh has great stability and requires only uniaxial experimental data for adequate fitting. This versatile model can capture up to 700% strains in elastomers.

11. Ogden Hyperelastic Model

This sophisticated hyperelastic model enables accurate modeling of rubbers and biological material at very high strains.

Here’s what you should know about it:

1. Accuracy: The Ogden model boasts accuracy, outshining other hyperelastic models in predicting material deformation.
2. Complexity: We’ve added options for model complexity – 1st, 2nd, or 3rd order. Allowing some flexibility when fitting the model to stress-strain relations with various levels of complexity.
3. Data fitting: To get the best results, you’ll need extensive experimental data, covering all three deformation modes (Uniaxial, Pure shear, Biaxial).

12. Select Similar Shapes

Our users can now Expand face selection by “Tangent faces”, “Same area” or “Same filet radius”. You will find this in the ‘right-click’ menu.

Note: The selection of similar bodies and selection of similar edges will be added at a later date.

Take These New Features for a Spin Yourself

All of these new features are now live and in production on SimScale. They are really just one browser window away from you!

If you wish to try out these new features for yourself and don’t already have a SimScale account, then you can easily sign up here for a trial. Please stay tuned for our next quarterly product update webinar and blog.

The post NEW Features: Temperature-Dependent Material Properties, Humidity Source Modeling, Non-Newtonian Fluids appeared first on SimScale.

Let’s get you up to date with SimScale’s new key features released in Q2 2023.

1. Custom Wind Comfort Criteria/Plots

SimScale already provides today a variety of different Pedestrian Wind Comfort Criteria, like Davenport, Lawson, London LDDC, NEN8100, and more.

Still, this list can never be exhaustive as there are a multitude of locally used and adapted comfort criteria that are either required by local authorities or have proven to be well suited to the specific local conditions.

SimScale enables our users to define their own comfort criteria with custom wind speed ranges and percentage thresholds.

With this new possibility, a range of new comfort criteria can be created. Here are some examples:

• CSTB Wind Comfort Standard
• Auckland Wind Comfort Criterion
• Melbourne Wind Comfort Criterion
• Bristol Wind Comfort Criterion
• Israeli Wind Criteria
• Murakami Wind Comfort Criteria

2. Thermal Resistance Networks for IBM

This feature is a natural extension to the Immersed Boundary solver and is already available for Conjugate Heat Transfer. It provides thermal resistance networks like two-resistor or star resistor models in the simulation setup and allows you to define detailed components like chips or LEDs as customized components. This avoids the necessity for very fine meshes for those often tiny components.

Users can define a thermal resistance network (TRN) by assigning the top surface of a cuboid as a TRN.

Model the chip as a simple cube in a CAD model or replace the detailed 3D model via ‘Simplify’ on SimScale.

3. Multiphase: Surface Tension

With the addition of surface tension, users of the new multiphase module will be able to improve the accuracy of multiphase results for surface tension dominant flows like microgravity sloshing, capillary flows, microfluidics, etc.

4. Ogden Hyperelastic Model

We have added this model to better simulate highly elastic rubber. In the animation below, you can see the movement of two solid parts coming together and separating again. There is a hollow rubber seal between them with significant deformation.

Use Case & Benefits

• Accurately simulate rubbery and biological materials at high strains
• Increasing hyperelastic functionality

5. Cylindrical Hinge Constraint

The Cylindrical hinge constraint boundary condition replicates the behavior of a fixed hinge. The assigned surface is constrained such that only rotational motion around the hinge axis is free.

SimScale can automatically detect the axis of the hinge based on an assigned cylindrical surface, but the boundary condition also allows for a user-defined input.

6. CAD Swap Improvements

When replacing one CAD model with another, it isn’t always clear what worked and what didn’t. With this feature, we add clarity so that users know what was successful and what requires their attention.

7. Parametric Studies

Boundary conditions can now be parametrized to run multiple simulations with a button click. Some examples are:

• Electronics: change inlet flow rates, change the heat load on parts
• AEC: change inlet flow rates to understand the impact on cooling strategies
• Rotating Machinery: change the inlet velocity and rotational velocity and compare designs

8. CAD Extrude Operations

Extrude is similar to move, although it will maintain the same cross-sectional area — often very useful.

This video shows one move operation followed by one extrude operation. Notice how the extrude option maintains the shape of the adjacent surfaces.

9. Distance Measurement

This is a highly requested feature, and I think we have answered nearly all use cases with this first iteration. We now offer the ability to measure the length/area of an entity and also measure the distance between two entities.

Take These New Features for a Spin Yourself

All of these new features are now live and in production on SimScale. They are really just one browser window away from you!

If you wish to try out these new features for yourself and don’t already have a SimScale account, you can easily sign up here for a trial or request a demo below. Please stay tuned for our next quarterly product update webinar and blog.

The post NEW Features: Custom Wind Comfort Criteria, Thermal Resistance Networks, Surface Tension, and More! appeared first on SimScale.

In this blog post, we want to get you up to date with all of the new key features released in Q1 2023. Let’s dive in!

1. Improved Wind Data for PWC Analysis
2. Humidity Modeling
3. Realizable Turbulence Model
4. Solids included in solar radiation
5. Joule Heating
6. Immersed Boundary Method (IBM) external flow domain flexibility
7. Simplify/heal bodies with Surface Wrapping
8. Multiphase
9. Relative Velocity
10. Boundary condition Visualization Inside 3D Viewer
11. Export result statistics to CSV
12. Teams and Permissions
13. Bilinear elastoplastic material model
14. “Max over Phase” von Mises stress result field for harmonic analysis

1. Improved Wind Data for PWC Analysis

Improved accuracy and global coverage with the new ERA5T dataset, which replaces the previous NEMS30 dataset. Also, the new modal is provided via our connected wind data service partner, meteoblue, and is the most accurate dataset available for wind data. Additionally, we now have the ability to derive seasonal wind roses from the new dataset, which will be coming in future months.

2. Humidity Modeling

Humidity plays a big part in thermal comfort analyses, and SimScale can now account for it.
Humidity modeling can be hugely important to internal thermal comfort studies for identifying where condensation might occur as well as for analyzing indoor environments where tightly controlled humidity levels are critical, such as concert halls, storage facilities, or indoor farming.

3. Realizable Turbulence Model

For urban wind applications, this turbulence model is declared as the preferred one by several best practice guidelines (COST Action 732) as well as wind engineering guidelines, such as the City of London (CoL) Wind Microclimate Guidelines (ref), if a steady-state CFD simulation is run.
The realizable k-epsilon model is now available for the Incompressible analysis type on SimScale within the top-level analysis type settings.

Use Case & Benefits

Urban pollutant dispersion analysis using the Incompressible analysis type on SimScale for enhanced result accuracy compared to the standard k-epsilon turbulence model.

4. Solids included in solar radiation

It is now possible to model solar loads in CHT analyses with models that have both fluids and solids included.

Use Case & Benefits

• Solar radiation can play a large factor in thermal comfort, and the ability to model it with solids included increases the overall simulation accuracy.
• Solid walls at the boundaries of the flow region don’t need to be modeled with specific boundary conditions defining the conductivity and material thickness but can instead be assigned the specific material, and their thermal properties will be correctly accounted for
• Solids inside the fluid domain simply need the correct material assigned.

The current limitation is that the solids in a CHT analysis with solar load can not be semi-transparent, so windows and facade glazings need to be modeled with an appropriate boundary condition.

5. Joule Heating

Q1 sees the release of Joule heating. This works with Direct Current (DC) applications and is integrated into the CHT and IBM analysis types. Applying Joule Heating to a part, or parts will cause them to heat up realistically.

6. Immersed Boundary Method (IBM) external flow domain flexibility

IBM (Immersed Boundary Method) now allows for different external flow domain positions. This means that we can position the test unit on the floor, wall, ceiling, or suspended in the middle.

Use Case & Benefits

Useful for:

• Lighting, as it can be positioned anywhere
• All electronic assemblies as they are often designed with multiple orientations and installation positions in mind

7. Simplify/heal bodies with Surface Wrapping

Parts are sometimes too complex to work with and so can be simplified with Simscale’s CAD tools. This can currently be found under ‘surface wrap’.

• Faulty models can cause meshing problems, and fixing/simplifying parts in advance should avoid this
• Sheet bodies can be difficult to mesh – wrapping them and forming a solid can solve this too

8. Multiphase

One of our highest-requested features is now in production!

This feature introduces a proprietary multiphase capability within SimScale, with industry-validated methods for high accuracy and fast simulation turnaround for rotating equipment, hydraulics, and industrial equipment simulations.

Benefits

• Volume-of-Fluid algorithm with proprietary high-order reconstruction scheme that captures sharp interfaces well
• Comprehensive physics, including heat transfer and surface tension
• Handling of realistic fluid and material properties
• Binary tree-based meshing and automatic local time stepping for proven stability for complicated geometries

Use-Cases

• All types of turbomachinery, rotating equipment & flow control simulations
• Hydraulic engineering / AEC applications (reservoir, dam gate, etc.)
• Industrial mixers, aeration tanks, tank filling simulations
• Marine applications (static ship hydrodynamics, propulsion systems)

9. Relative Velocity

For correct visualization of rotating equipment flow simulations, it is important to show velocity relative to the rotating blades.

Visualizing the relative velocity field in a turbomachine is crucial as it gives designers insight into the nature of flow within the machine. It is used for creating velocity triangles, which help designers estimate the early-stage performance of the rotating geometry.

Highly demanded by our turbomachinery customers, SimScale will now compute and render relative velocity fields through the rotating regions. This field can be visualized as streamlines, vectors, contours, iso-surfaces, or iso-volumes, and will provide our users greater insight into the flow around rotating components.

10. Boundary condition Visualization Inside 3D Viewer

Boundary conditions are now shown inside SimScale! This has been a long time coming, with (believe it or not) years of effort to prepare everything in the background. Now that it is live, we will continue to iterate on it. If you are actively using SimScale, you will see this evolve over the next quarters.

11. Export result statistics to CSV

The ‘Statistics’ panel can now export all of the data points into a CSV file for external processing. This can be hugely useful with models that contain multiple fluid channels like the one shown below.

Use Cases

• Large organizations that need to control access to content internally
• Small organizations that need to organize content more efficiently

Benefits

• Granular access control
• Intuitive data segregation
• Control of sharing of Team content
• All self-managed

12. Teams and Permissions

Members of teams can now have varying levels of access to content contained within a team, and administrators can manage these settings in their dashboard.

Each member can have view, copy, or edit permissions of the teams they belong to. Each team also includes a setting to control with whom content can be shared (to/from a team):

• No sharing
• Share within the Team
• Share with the organization
• Share with anyone

13. Bilinear elastoplastic material model

Users can now apply bi-linear material behavior via a dedicated interface. Young’s Modulus, Yield stress, Ultimate stress, and strain are simple to define. This change improves non-linear simulation robustness.

14. “Max over Phase” von Mises stress result field for harmonic analysis

Von Mises stress is now available for each frequency in harmonic analyses. This means that as well as identifying resonant frequencies, engineers can also ensure that the structure remains within maximum stress safety limits.

Take These New Features for a Spin Yourself 

All of these new features are now live on SimScale. They are really just one browser window away from you! If you wish to try out these new features for yourself and don’t already have a SimScale account then you can easily sign up here for a trial. Please stay tuned for our next quarterly product update.

The post NEW Features: Multiphase, Joule Heating, Humidity Modeling, Boundary Condition Visualization, and More! appeared first on SimScale.

Transient Conjugate Heat Transfer

Transient simulations capture changes over time, where no steady state really exists.

• Components heating or cooling over time
• Fans failing — how long does it take until critical temperatures are reached?

Individual Color Settings for Model Parts

It is now possible to change color settings independently for each part of the simulated model. This improves rendering by allowing users to customize their scene and enhance results visualization over the original model.

Wall Roughness Factor for Subsonic Simulations

It is now possible to add the wall roughness factor for more accurate modeling of wall boundary conditions in Subsonic simulations. For applications such as rotating machinery and flow valves, it is important to model surface roughness in order to accurately assess its influence on flow conditions and calculate pressure rise/drop.

This functionality allows analyzing complex model cases such as:

• Erosion of surfaces due to cavitation or particulate matter 
• Accumulation of particles (debris) on the surfaces 
• Inherent roughness of the material used 
• Manufacturing processes e.g., 3D printing can create uneven surfaces

Stress-strain Mapped from Company Material Library into SimScale

It is now possible to directly use a stress-strain curve from your company material library for structural simulations. This means faster simulation setup times and reduced input errors. Users will no longer need to characterize elastoplastic material behavior and nonlinear materials with data tables and can directly utilize the material behavior available in their company library.

The added value of this functionality is especially useful for:

• Analyzing elastoplastic material behavior of mechanical components
• Simulating fasteners where the stress-strain curve is mapped vs temperature

Thin Section Mesh Refinement for Structural Analysis

Maximize accuracy and solution efficiency by modeling low-thickness parts with second-order hexahedral and prismatic elements using the new ‘thin section mesh refinement‘.

Physical Contact Monitoring

During nonlinear contact simulations, you are now provided with contact monitoring plots keeping you in the loop on contact penetration and solution convergence, giving you confidence and control over your result outputs.

Conformal Meshing for Heat Transfer Analyses

This is the first step in the direction of conformal meshing for all structural analysis which will bring gains in terms of bonded and thermal contact accuracy as well as dramatically improved solution performance thanks to the merging of nodes at contact surfaces.

Non-linear Static Analysis Stability: Automatic Boundary Condition Ramping

Increasing the automation and robustness of nonlinear static analyses. This feature will ramp up constant loads in the background if necessary for a stable solution.

Highlight Minimum and Maximum Values

Highlight the minimum and maximum values for a given result quantity (within Statistics). This is an extremely valuable way for engineers to quickly and precisely view simulation results.

It is especially useful for:

• Locating the maximum stress within a structure to predict the factor of safety
• Identifying the highest displacements within assemblies

Clear Vibration Result Presentation

A number of post-processing improvements have been released to provide intuitive and clear default post-processing for vibration analyses.

• Frequency analysis deformations are now scaled for a perfect fit within the viewer
• Magnitude and phase are now set as default for all result fields in harmonic analysis, providing physically meaningful visualization of complex quantities
• Absolute motion results can now be visualized for harmonic analysis with base excitation allowing direct comparison with physical test data

Improved Robustness for PWC and Incompressible (LBM) via Manual Velocity Scaling

The LBM solver on SimScale used for the Incompressible (LBM) and Pedestrian Wind Comfort analysis, pacefish®, is using an explicit time stepping to solve the transient flow analysis. For some cases where we experience locally very high velocities in automotive aerodynamics or urban wind simulations, the local LBM velocities can surpass the stability cliff of 0.5, leading to divergence. For such cases, we enable an option in the simulation control to manually adjust the velocity scaling factor to a value lower than the default value of 0.1.

Aerodynamic Roughness in PWC and LBM

This feature provides two new input options for Aerodynamic Roughness:

1. Enable the direct definition of “Aerodynamic Roughness”, e.g., z₀= 0.5m to represent a Suburban exposure or z₀ = 1m for an Urban Exposure
2. Alternatively, using an automatic definition “from Exposure”. Here the selected surfaces will get the respective aerodynamic roughness from the exposure category for each individual wind direction assigned

Natural Convection Boundary Condition for Natural Ventilation Cases

Connect outdoor wind simulations with internal, natural convection studies. The natural convection boundary condition takes into account the facade pressure conditions influenced by outdoor wind and surrounding buildings, improving the accuracy of indoor CFD analyses.

The workflow for the natural ventilation boundary condition consists of the following steps:

• Run a Pedestrian Wind Comfort (PWC) study on the building of interest and its surroundings
• Apply the facade pressure results from the previous simulation as reference pressure for the natural ventilation BC in a consecutive indoor analysis

Dashboard Folders and Spaces

• You can now organize your projects into folders
• Companies can also create spaces that give access to limited groups of users

Take These New Features for a Spin Yourself 

All of these new features are now live on SimScale. They are really just one browser window away from you! If you wish to try out these new features for yourself and don’t already have a SimScale account then you can easily sign up here for a trial. Please stay tuned for our next quarterly product update.

The post NEW Features: Wall Roughness Factor, Contact Monitoring, Conformal Meshing, Dashboard Improvements, and More! appeared first on SimScale.

As a cloud-native application, SimScale is able to continuously release new features and perform regular product maintenance on the fly. We realize that it’s often difficult to keep up with the latest news so this blog provides you with an opportunity to get up to date with all of the main new features released in Q3 2022. Enjoy!

Rotational Modal Analysis

Rotational modal analyses allow users to simulate rotating shafts and take into account centrifugal forces, stiffness, and damping effects. This is important for rotating machinery applications (turbomachinery or electric machines). Users are able to export the modal analysis results to construct a Campbell Diagram to understand a component/system’s response spectrum.

• Simulates rotating shafts taking into account centrifugal forces 
• Includes gyroscopic stiffness (and gyroscopic damping) effects

Use Case & Benefits

• Rotating machinery engineers looking to perform vibration analysis, modal surveys, and frequency analyses
• Accurate calculation of eigenmodes for rotating machinery
• The ability to produce Campbell Diagrams

Sweep Meshing for Structural

Sweep meshing is now available for structural analysis simulations. This feature generates a prismatic mesh that sweeps between two surfaces. This feature is useful for reducing the mesh count and speeding up simulations, which saves time.

• Generates a prismatic mesh, swept from a source to a target surface
• Define element thickness and number of elements along the sweep direction
• Optionally define the absolute size of the mesh on the source and target faces
• Supports multiple source/target end face pairs

Use Case & Benefits

• Applications needing to efficiently mesh high aspect ratio shapes
• Improves meshing efficiency and solution accuracy

Nonlinear Stability

Several enhancements to our structural nonlinear settings have been released to improve simulation success rate/robustness with smart default numerics. Highlights include: 

• User-friendly contact stiffness control, ensuring valid penalty coefficient selection for node-to-surface nonlinear contact based on contacting materials
• Reactive nonlinear solution control. This adds additional iterations, where needed, to improve simulation convergence and success

Use Case & Benefits

• Smarter default settings make nonlinear simulation even more stable and accessible

Fan Modeling

Model fans with a simple volume (momentum source), rather than needing to model the fan in detail. This is much faster than a detailed approach and a fan curve can still be applied. Fans are used extensively for active cooling in the electronics and EV/HEV industries.

• Fan Momentum Source: Allows modeling of internal fans as a momentum source that is embedded within the model
• Fan Curves: Allows modeling of fans based on fan curves (flow rate vs pressure drop). Fan curve tables can be created via table input or uploaded from a CSV file
• Fan Boundary Condition: Users can specify a Fan Inlet or Fan Outlet as a boundary condition to model fans that are placed at the edge of the enclosure

Use Case & Benefits

• Engineers who are interested in flow simulations using active fan cooling where the fan geometry is not part of the design optimization process
• Users can input fan curves from the manufacturer’s specification
• Predict the operating point of the fan

Real Gas Model

The Real Gas Model is important for accurately simulating “real” fluids that have physical and thermodynamic properties that vary as a function of temperature and pressure.

This significant new feature allows SimScale to accurately model compressors, the behavior of supercooled liquids, or the flow of steam in a steam turbine.

• Density and Conductivity are expressed as a function of Pressure and Temperature
• Users are able to input thermodynamic properties as a table, or upload a CSV file

Use Case & Benefits

• Turbomachinery and flow control simulation applications that need to model real gas effects observed at very low temperatures or very high pressures e.g., compressor modeling, supercooled liquid simulation, CO2 capture
• Allows engineers to include realistic fluid properties in their simulations, including experimental data that helps tune the simulation results to be more reliable

Parametric Studies

Perform parametric studies on various settings. These include the most common CFD and FEA inputs, such as velocity, pressure, temperature, power and momentum source values, centrifugal forces, and more. SimScale will run all of these studies for you in parallel.

Use Case & Benefits

• Any users who wish to parameterize boundary conditions. Examples include:
  • Electronics cooling: Change inlet flow rates or heat loads on a part to understand the impact on cooling strategies
  • Flow Control: Compare the performance of a valve with different inlet velocities
  • Turbomachinery: Set up various rotational speeds and compare results
  • AEC – HVAC: Change inlet flow rates to understand the impact on cooling efficiency
• This automated process adds value to SimScale by enabling users to quickly compare designs and understand which is the optimum

Heat Flux, Heat Transfer Coefficient, and Nusselt Number

SimScale users can now plot and measure heat transfer, a highly requested feature for applications like heat exchangers, electronics enclosures, and building design. Three results are available:

• Heat flux
• Heat transfer coefficient (HTC) 
• Nusselt number

Use Case & Benefits

• AEC users that want to compute the total heat loss through walls/facade/windows — especially useful for Thermal Bridging Calculations
• Electronics designers who need to understand the flow of heat through their assembly
• Cooling or heating systems, often incorporating heat exchangers and heat sinks

Age of Air

AEC simulation users can now calculate & visualize the Local Mean Age of Air (of any fluid) or Mean Residence Time (in seconds). Understanding the mean age of air and air exchange rates is critical when designing ventilation systems in buildings, especially for natural or mixed ventilation applications where engineers need to demonstrate that a design complies with regulatory requirements.

 Use Case & Benefits

• Designers of indoor ventilation strategies where Mean Age of Air and Air Exchange rates are common design goals and even needed for compliance — in schools or factories for example
• Users can easily assess and compare age of air across different design strategies

Porous Media

This porous media feature allows the simulation of partially permeable materials. It was developed to make it easier and faster to model lattices, grids, or perforations that would normally be represented as 3D solids but are challenging to mesh due to the level of detail present. This feature can also be used to model dense filter materials.

Use Case & Benefits

• Reduces the effort needed to simplify CAD geometry and reduces meshing effort & mesh size, in turn reducing simulation time. Overall a much easier process for users.
• The exact flow through these regions is usually not important, but the correct modeling of pressure drop and how it globally affects the flow is.

Take These New Features for a Spin Yourself

All of these new features are now live on Simscale and just one browser window away from you! If you wish to try out these new features for yourself and don’t already have a SimScale account then you can easily sign up here for a trial. Please stay tuned for our next quarterly product update.

The post NEW Features: Rotational Modal Analysis, Real Gasses, Fan Modeling, Parametric Studies, and More! appeared first on SimScale.

Digital prototyping, in many stages along the R&D cycle, not only reduces cost and time by avoiding the trial-and-error characteristics typically seen in physical prototyping but also allows engineers to explore the full design space. 

We have created the world’s first cloud-native platform for engineering simulation covering fluid, thermal, structural applications, and more. Here, we cover how our simulation solution, now with additional specialization for rotating machinery, can yield reliable, accurate results faster than ever. 

Versatile and Accessible

Our proprietary solver is a versatile solution for a broad range of applications within the rotating machinery industry. From compressors and fans to turbochargers and propellers, engineers can leverage engineering simulation that gets them results quickly for analyzing and improving designs. 

Accessibility is the foundation of SimScale’s vision. You can import your native CAD files, run simulations and process your results without ever leaving your web browser. As a simulation solution born in the cloud, SimScale gives engineers access to their projects from anywhere at any time. Nothing is run locally, liberating engineers from the myriad constraints of traditional simulation software. Large file sharing is a thing of the past, as projects can be shared with colleagues and customers with a simple web link. 

Additionally, with SimScale’s API, you can easily integrate customized workflows with your existing tools and processes. SimScale is part of the strong push for digital transformation in the rotating equipment industry.

Fast and Accurate

Accuracy is of utmost importance to those in the rotating equipment and industrial equipment market and, that is why we make no compromises when it comes to performing true and accurate simulation. Our proprietary solver technology, designed specifically for rotating machinery, was tested extensively, validated against industry-standard models, and approved by our very own customers. The graph below shows the strong performance, validated for both compressible and incompressible flows.

With the cloud doing the heavy lifting, SimScale’s new offering is one of the fastest solutions on the market. Meshing is completely automated and solving complex equations needed for rotating equipment simulations are handled by the cloud, leaving designers free to kick off multiple simulations in parallel and iterate with speed. Pump curves have been simulated in less than 15 minutes and were validated to within 2% of manufacturers’ data.

Learn more in our whitepaper: Simulating Turbomachinery Designs 10x Faster

Download Whitepaper

New Solution for Rotating Equipment Industry

SimScale is dedicated to making simulation both technically and economically accessible. It’s why we created the world’s first platform for engineering simulation born entirely in the cloud. The power of the cloud grants engineers access to HPC, without ever leaving their web browser, facilitating accurate simulation, computational resources that scale up on-demand, exceptional ease of use, and a new suite of sharing and collaboration features. The rotating machinery industry has a strong need for accuracy and reduced turnaround times, thus demanding the adoption of scalable HPC. 

The post Better Rotating Equipment with Cloud-Native Engineering Simulation appeared first on SimScale.

1) New Feature: Radiation for Conjugate Heat Transfer v2.0 

The development of this feature is important for electronics cooling in natural convection, where there can be a significant temperature difference between solids and the air. Once larger differences are present, radiation starts to have a significant impact. For this specific feature, surfaces are considered either completely transparent or opaque (grey body). The surface to surface radiation approach is based on the discrete ordinate method (DOM), which provides a domain discretization in angular variables, hence providing a discrete representation of radiative directions.

How to Use This Feature:

In order to enable radiation, the user will need to activate the “Radiation” toggle in the simulation option (see picture below).

When the user assigns solid materials, they will find a new field for the emissivity (see picture below). The emissivity is already provided for the specific material selected by the user, however it can be changed if further customization is required.

Then, the user will find a new field also for the boundary conditions. In particular, for “velocity inlet”, “pressure outlet”, and “natural convection inlet/outlet”, the “far field temperature” will need to be specified (examples in below images).

For the “Wall” boundary condition (used to model a solid that isn’t present in the analysis) the radiative behaviour has to be set as either:

• Opaque (typical grey body): the user must also also specify the emissivity of the selected wall. 
• Transparent (typical glass window): the user must specify the far-field temperature.

For radiative heat transfer problems, further settings can be changed within the numerics, as shown in the picture below. Most importantly, the radiation resolution can be changed. This affects the discretization of the directions for which the radiative problem is solved. The settings are coarse, moderate and fine. Increasing the radiation resolution will lead to a higher number of directions and hence improved angular discretization of the radiative problem (usually a more accurate result).

2) New Feature: Thin Layer Resistance for Conjugate Heat Transfer v2.0

This feature allows users to describe the thermal behavior of very thin layers of material, such as thermal paste, or coatings on electronics components. These thin layers would need a very fine mesh to capture and so it is more efficient to simply model a surface. The interface is given an additional resistance value, which affects the heat transfer as if it were a solid: all the heat going through the thin layer will result in a temperature gradient.

How to Use This Feature: 

Thin layer resistances are set up in ‘contacts’. The user has to select the targeted interfaces within the domain and click on “Filter contacts by selection” (see picture below).

Next, the user will select the “thin layer resistance interface” option for the Interface type, and then they can input the thermal conductivity and the layer thickness for the specific selection (see picture below).

This paper addresses the difference between on-premises software and SaaS
solutions for computer-aided engineering, explaining how SaaS came to be and its
key benefits.

Download White Paper

3) Product Update: Mesh Visualizer Performance Optimization

Our mesh quality visualizer now provides a significant boost in loading performance that will allow you to visualize your mesh much faster than ever before.

The mesh quality visualizer provides advanced functionality to generate detailed analyses for a variety of mesh related metrics. This includes aspect ratio, non-orthogonality, volume ratio, edge ratio, and minimum edge length. The ability to rapidly configure legends and set up cutting planes makes it easier to get an understanding of your mesh before a simulation is prepared.

How to Use This Update: 

To access the mesh quality visualizer, simply click on the “Mesh Quality” option under the ‘Mesh’ section (as shown in the image below). The visualizer will take a few moments to load after which you can perform your mesh interrogation.

4) Product Update: Volume Refinement with the Standard Mesher

Continuing our efforts to make the standard mesher more robust in a variety of applications, local refinements have now been improved to allow the user to select existing volumes as refinement regions, in addition to the ability to create and use primitives as refinement regions.

How to Use This Update:

While defining the region refinements for the standard mesher, simply select the volumes to be refined when prompted. Specify the maximum cell size, and the mesher will ensure that the refinement is applied entirely to the selected volumes.

The following short video illustrates the functionality using an assembly comprising multiple rivets which may need to be refined.

5) New Feature: PCB Material – FR4

It is now possible to assign a specific material, FR4, for PCB components. This new feature allows the user to assign cross-plane orthotropic conductivity for Conjugate Heat Transfer (CHT) simulations of electronic components.

How to Use This Feature: 

FR4 conductivity is defined as cross-plane orthotropic. In the material panel it is possible to specify the in-plane conductivity (isotropic conductivity) and the cross-plane conductivity which is defined normal to the in-plane. Moreover, the orientation of the conductivity can be specified depending on the chosen reference system:

• Cartesian: the cross-plane conductivity is defined along the Z-axis as per the global reference frame.
• Custom: the cross-plane conductivity can be arbitrarily defined using unit vectors, and the resulting orthogonal plane is the one on which the in-plane conductivity acts.

Download our ‘Tips for Architecture, Engineering & Construction (AEC)’ white paper to learn how to optimize your designs with cloud-based CFD!

Download Now

6) Product Update: Standard Mesher (Manual) Minimum Edge Length 

The standard mesher is in a phase of constant evolution and improvement, and the addition of the ability to specify a minimum edge length for a manual mesh generation is another step in the direction of making the standard mesher a more robust meshing solution.

Previously, users only had the ability to specify a “Maximum Edge Length” for the standard mesher, but with the deprecation of the Tet-Dominant mesher (which had the ability to enter a minimum edge length), and requirements coming in from customers to support this, we have developed and rolled out this functionality to all users.

It is important, however, to understand that the specification of the maximum edge length and the minimum edge length are in no way strict numbers that the mesher will try to enforce in all scenarios, since there can be a multitude of situations where adhering to those limits would not be optimal and may even generate a sub-optimal mesh. These parameters only provide the user with the ability to define bounds within which the mesher will try to maintain the mesh size, but will still always respect model complexities in order to generate the best possible mesh.

How to Use This Update:

The update is now available as an additional input option for the Standard Manual mesher as shown in the interface snapshot below:

7) Product Update: New Post-Processor Releases

A first public version of SimScale’s new online post-processor has recently been released as an open beta to all SimScale users.

As promised, more and more features have been added meanwhile. Here a short summary of the current progress and what to expect next:

• [Released] Automatic rotating zones

When post-processing a simulation result that contains a rotating zone (transient/AMI), the rotating region will now be animated accordingly when playing a time step animation.

• [Released] Projecting vectors on cutting plane

The new post-processor now also allows for projecting vectors on a cutting plane. Find this option in the vector settings within the cutting plane controls.

• [Coming soon] More color schemes

Requested by many users, the ability to change the color scheme applied to the model for a given result field will be released within the coming days. Find this option in the context menu of the legend bar controls.

• [Next] New post-processor for structural analyses

While currently only being available for fluid flow analyses, the new post-processing interface will soon also be available for all remaining structural analysis simulations.

How to Use This Product Update:

1. When entering post-processing mode, you’ll be prompted with a choice to either continue using the old post-processor or try the new one.
2. For now, the new post-processor is only available for Fluid Flow analysis types. The open beta phase for the remaining structural simulation analysis types will follow shortly.

The post SimScale’s Autumn Product Update appeared first on SimScale.

Update One: 3D Result and Forces Output PwC Analyses

Our customers already had access to 3D result export functionality from a single-directional Incompressible (LBM) analysis and this is now added to the multi-directional Pedestrian Wind Comfort setup. With a single setting, 3D results will be available for each individual wind direction, up to the maximum of 36.

Update Two: Updated Bulk Calculator

When viewing results and selecting parts or cutting planes, a summary of the result fields is shown. As a recent update, this summary is now also split by the result region, enabling users to inspect the result summary individually per region.

Update Three: Porous Media for PwC and LBM

When using the Pedestrian Wind Comfort analysis type, our customers now have the possibility to model trees. With built-in tree models based on a library of tree species SimScale makes it extremely easy to set up a tree with the correct wind hindrance properties.

Instead of modeling single trees individually, there exists also the option to model the combined effect of a park or forest with many trees.

The impact of modeling the trees can be visualized below, where an animation shows the difference between two simulations. The right-hand simulation uses porous regions to model trees, whereas in the left model the trees were ignored. The difference in the overall wind flow and especially the velocities at the pedestrian level is clearly visible.

Update Four: Live Results

While running a (non-LBM) CFD simulation, the post-processor will now regularly provide the opportunity to update and show more recently available results for your simulations. This means users no longer have to wait until a run is complete to begin assessing results.

That’s all for now, but stay tuned for more to come! 

Other Recent Product Update Blogs from SimScale:

• 8 SimScale Updates to Kick Off 2020
• Product Updates: CAD Faults, Automatic Simulation Core Choice, & More
• 8 Updates You Should Know About: New Platform Features
• SimScale Releases Major User Interface Update for a Better Simulation Experience in the Cloud
• Queuing Simulations & Auto-contacts for Conjugate Heat Transfer | Product Update
• Automatic Contact Detection | SimScale Product Update

The post March 2020 Product Update From SimScale appeared first on SimScale.

1. Helping You Identify CAD Issues

If you upload a CAD file that we know won’t mesh, we will indicate what is wrong, where the issue is, and block the simulation from being set up. This gives you the chance to fix your CAD model before working through the setup in SimScale.

In order for the model to be meshed with high quality and therefore produce stable and reliable results, it should not contain any ambiguous or missing geometry information. This is what we call a ‘CAD fault’. A CAD fault, or error, occurs when the information in a CAD model contains inconsistent or missing pieces, like interfering faces or badly defined edges.

When a faulty CAD model has been imported, a red icon is shown next to the imported CAD tree item. The error message will display “Geometry contains faults,” and the “Create Simulation” button is disabled, preventing any simulation from being performed. This was put in place in order to reduce the risk of having a bad quality mesh and unstable simulation runs.

Another section is created on the right side of the interface, in addition to the geometrical entities hierarchy tree and the topological entity sets, that shows a list of detected CAD faults. When one of the geometry fault items is clicked on, the entity (an edge, a face or a vertex) causing the fault is highlighted and zoomed in on. In addition, the type of fault, name of the affected entities, and the suggested corrective actions are described in the error message.

Common CAD Faults

• Bad vertex position: This happens when a node is not on the geometrical curve of the edge, potentially due to bad tolerances. The view informs the user which entities are involved with this CAD fault, and adjusts the zoom level to fit the area in question.

• Self-intersecting geometry: This fault is present when one body has entities intersecting another. This can be observed when two surfaces intersect, and one surface “disappears” into the other, leaving no edge at their intersection. As can be seen below, the two shades of gray reveal that two surfaces are intersecting. Deleting one of these two surfaces, after having investigated which one is irrelevant, would solve this issue.

2. Automatic Core Choice for Simulation

To help reduce the risk of someone choosing a computational instance that is too small (or large!), we now make this choice for you. The complexity, size, and parameters of your simulation setup are inputted into a powerful algorithm that selects the right number of cores, making the computational resource usage more efficient. In other words, this means faster runs with fewer core hours used. This important feature aims at avoiding scenarios where too few cores are selected and consequently the run fails due to lack of memory available for the solver, or too many cores selected, leading to an inefficient and lengthy parallelization of a domain that slows the solver down. The normal option of core selection is all still available if you have a preference (although we highly recommend you automate).

3. Radiation for CHT

A few months ago, we added radiation for the ‘convective heat transfer’ analysis type. In this update, we are bringing this feature to our ‘conjugate heat transfer’ analysis type! This means that we are able to combine all three transfer mechanisms into one single simulation.

This means that you are now able to assess the impact of radiation on the internal temperature of the solids of your model. This new feature comes with similar settings to the ones in place for the convective heat transfer analysis type (find out more here). The emissivity value now needs to be set up as a material property as opposed to a surface property.

Conclusion

With these three new feature updates, you can now:

• Increase meshing success as we provide insights into whether or not your CAD model has faults. If there is a problem, we ensure that you know what type of issue the model has, as well as where the issue lies within your geometry.
• Have certainty in using the right number of cores for each of your runs, making sure the usage of computational resources are cost and time-efficient.
• Have the option to include the effect of radiation in your conjugate heat transfer analyses, taking into consideration the emissivity value of solid materials and how they impact the temperature distribution of the domain.

Stay on the lookout for more updates to come! 2020 is around the corner, and it will bring more exciting, useful, and practical improvements to our ever-growing platform!

The post Product Updates: CAD Faults, Automatic Simulation Core Choice, & More appeared first on SimScale.