Last week I knocked out another live USTREAM show. This one was all about utilizing the simulation tools inside of Autodesk Inventor Professional. So (of course) I killed it - Dynamic Simulation to FEA, to Parametric Optimization. My goal was to demonstrate how Inventor is so much more than a 3D modeling tool. We always talk about Digital Prototyping, but what does it mean to have/do/be a Digital Prototype? What a better example, right?
Then a voice from the grandstands that I've been thinking about all weekend. "FEA is above my pay grade." I know the guy that said it, and I think he was joking - but it made me think. If a power user sees FEA as something that somebody else does or is concerned about, am I talking about what our engineering tools can do for our users in the right way? It's a good question, how can Dynamic Simulation and FEA help our users make better products? What's holding back power users from using the tools? How does a posi-track on a '48 Plymouth work? I don't know, it just does... (movie?)
But seriously, I brought this up about six months ago on a blog - Do you use CAD as a documentation tool or as a design and engineering tool? What I mean is that are you simply modeling a design that has already been worked out, or just moving something from 2D to 3D? Alternatively, as you design are you concerned about the strength, weight, or safety factor and genuinely take that into account while you are modeling? Full of questions today aren't I... Yes, this was the stuff floating around in my head all weekend.
So here was the situation - I had an assembly that somebody had modeled up and I wanted to put this thing in motion. While in motion I wanted to find the peak stresses that were applied to it, then export those into FEA. Within FEA, I wanted to run several different sizes to make sure I'm getting the lightest, and strongest, configuration of the part that I'm applying the force to. This is a process that I see can repeat itself over and over - if I'm updating an existing design or even creating new. Check out the episode:
Not so hard is it? So I ask you - Is simulation above your pay grade?
-Rob
Subscribe
Movie: "My Cousin Vinny"
Simulation hasn't been something I need to use due to the fact that most of my work involves static frame structures that use members that have already been calculated. I have used simulation on products that I'm designing from scratch or to see if I could get improvements on existing products. But those instances don't happen all that often for me.
Posted by: QubeIt | 07/26/2010 at 11:57 AM
The positraction stuff was from My Cousin Vinny, but the car was a 63 Tempest wasn't it? Wasn't the whole gist of Mona Lisa's testimony that the Buick Skylark, while sold in the same green color as the Tempest/GTO, was not available with Positraction?
Posted by: ProphetPVD | 07/26/2010 at 12:21 PM
So far 0 'fer two. It's not My Cousin Vinny.
Posted by: Rob Cohee | 07/26/2010 at 12:24 PM
Joe Dirt. One of the last great minds...
Posted by: Mike Simms | 07/26/2010 at 12:41 PM
Ding, Ding! Nice work Mike. Joe Dirt when he was asking his parents why they left him alone. My other favorite from that movie - "You're talkin' to my guy all wrong..."
Posted by: Rob Cohee | 07/26/2010 at 01:29 PM