Technical Papers
Fluid Dynamics Simulation Keeps Aerospace Design Costs Trim
Aerospace manufacturers, like most other industries, are urgently pursuing cost-saving measures to deal with today’s economic and market realities. But due to the complexity of aerospace products plus the safety and regulatory issues that uniquely affect them, it is not possible simply to use cheaper materials or lighter packaging. Cost savings (and their synonym, time savings) must be found elsewhere. Terms like “lean engineering” have joined the lexicon of efficiency as aerospace producers seek ways to do more with less.
The discipline of software-based modeling in its many forms is proving to be the salvation of manufacturers working under pressure to deliver end products of proven quality at lower cost, and in less time. Almost every aspect of product design, from mechanical housings to printed circuit boards, has its own dedicated modeling toolset to aid engineers with basic layout, “what-if” trials and more. Not surprisingly, modeling is an enabling tool for today’s aggressive efficiency strategies.
More Techpubs
CFD for Mechanical Design Engineers - “A Paradigm Shift for Better Design”
This paper provides CIMdata’s perspective on Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis; the motivations for its use, its value and future, and the importance for making CFD available to all engineers earlier in the product design/development lifecycle. It also describes Mentor Graphics’ FloEFD CFD analysis solution that is designed to provide product designers and engineers with direct access to CFD techniques directly in their design (CAD) environment. The following sections address:
- CFD Market Drivers—a brief review of the challenges that affect, and impacts from the early use of CFD within an overall Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) strategy
- Value of Earlier Use of CFD—a brief discussion of the benefits associated with early use of CFD
- Mentor Graphics’ Approach and CFD Solution—how FloEFD enables early use of CFD by designers
- Summary and Concluding Comments—a brief summary of the paper along with concluding remarks
Gas Mixing Best Practices
This white paper describes the application of CFD to gas mixing processes, including a discussion of best practice backed up by simulation guidelines and a real world example. The paper concludes with an analysis of the financial impact of using CAD-embedded CFD for gas mixing through reduced design iteration and fewer physical prototypes based on data from Aberdeen Group.
Accelerating Automotive Design with Engineering Fluid Dynamics
This white paper gives a broad introduction to the application of CFD to automotive applications. A new class of software, known as Engineering Fluid Dynamics fits directly into the product design flow, making CFD accessible to small- and mid-sized enterprises, removing the need to hire or train CFD specialists, outsource to consultants, or conduct tests on multiple physical prototypes.
Solving the System-Level Thermal Management Challenges of LEDs
This white paper describes the use of CFD for LED lighting products. Thermal management is by far the most critical aspect of LED product design as both light output and lifetime are strongly affected by LED junction temperature. CFD simulation helps manufacturers optimize the design of heat sinks and other parts of the luminaire to produce low-cost, high performance products.
EFD Meshing Technology
This paper discusses a key technology on which Mentor Graphics’ FloEFD software suite is founded: Rectangular Adaptive Meshing (RAM). Written for the lay reader, the paper recaps the need for a computational mesh, and discusses the choices available. Factors affecting this choice are then discussed: cell shape, geometry representation, mesh structure and grid generation. Finally FloEFD’s RAM technology is described.
The Five Myths of Computational Fluid Dynamics
This white paper explains the impact of the latest advances in CFD software that helps companies use CFD to improve product performance, reduce time to market, and lower engineering costs. Yet the previous disadvantages of CFD persist as myths, preventing greater use of CFD in the early phases of mechanical design.
Why is Engineering Fluid Dynamics (EFD) the Right Choice for CFD Analysis
In addition to the benefits of EFD for CFD analysis, why other programs slow down your progress is also addressed. This white paper examines these questions from a number of standpoints, including the need to deal effectively with existing CAD geometry, geometry simplification, creating additional geometry to support the analysis and meshing. Find out how EFD removes the need for a crystal ball and how effortless “what-if” analyses are possible.
Embedded Flow Simulation Improves Decision-Making and Accelerates Mechanical Design
This white paper describes the philosophy and key technologies behind a new breed of CFD software known as Engineering Fluid Dynamics (EFD). EFD is fully-embedded concurrent flow simulation in 3D MCAD design environments, using native 3D CAD data directly for fluid flow simulations without the need for any translation or copies, through a unique "Direct-CAD-to-CFD" technology.