MSC Software Corporation

The traditional approach for suppliers to the automobile industry has been to build parts according to drawings provided by original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). Today, OEMs are delegating much more of the design responsibility to suppliers. This trend significantly changes the role of suppliers who, instead of competing primarily on quality, price and delivery time, are now often judged based on their ability to develop an innovative design that can meet the OEM’s requirements and be produced at a high level of quality and a low cost.

As a leading supplier of gaskets to the automotive industry and other markets, Interseals responded to these trends by increasing the size and capabilities of its engineering team. Yet, in the past, the company still faced difficulties in meeting its customers’ requests for innovative and economical designs. Gaskets are difficult to design because rubber components can undergo large deformations under load, sustaining strains of up to 500% in engineering applications. The load-extension behavior of rubber is extremely nonlinear and time and temperature dependent. Previously, when Interseals engineers based their initial designs on experience and handbook formulas, they usually found that the initial prototype did not meet the customer’s requirements. Typically, it took two more iterations to get the design right. Each design iteration cost an average of 5,000 Euros in tooling expenses and took between six and eight weeks.

Interseals engineers shared the simulation results with the customer and the customer gave the go-ahead to build the mold. When the mold was completed, Interseals made a number of prototypes and provided them to the customer. “The customer tested the prototypes and said that they met every requirement,” Izzo said. “Getting the design right the first time saved an estimated 10,000 Euros in additional tooling costs and made it possible to deliver the gaskets 16 weeks earlier than if 2 additional prototype iterations had been required as was normal with our previous design methods.”

• Marc has been capable of predicting the complex nonlinear behavior, while taking into account time and temperature effects and calculate compressible and incompressible material models based on test data.
• Using simulation allowed the customer to save an estimated 10,000 Euros in additional tooling costs and made it possible to deliver the gaskets 16 weeks earlier than with the previous design methods

An automobile’s exhaust system is becoming more and more critical to its success in the marketplace. Most important, the sound produced by the vehicle serves to a considerable degree as the signature of the brand. For example, an auto enthusiast can recognize the approach of a Bentley or Ferrari with his or her eyes closed. Purchasers of lower-priced vehicles may not be quite so finicky but they still expect to hear a certain sound when they start up the engine. Meanwhile, automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEM) are being forced by government regulations to reduce the levels of noise emitted from the tailpipe. Automakers are also hoping to reduce the back pressure of exhaust systems in order to achieve improvements in fuel economy.

It’s becoming increasingly difficult to meet these often conflicting goals using conventional passive exhaust system technology which relies upon the use of perforated tubes and chambers to filter out acoustic waves. Automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are looking at active exhaust systems as a way to address these issues. Active exhaust systems use a loudspeaker driven by a microprocessor to cancel out unwanted sound generated by the engine as well as to produce more desirable sounds. A key advantage of active exhaust systems is that they can be controlled by software to adjust the output of the loudspeaker to deliver just the right sound under a wide range of different operating conditions.

“Actran has enabled Tenneco to develop a process for electroacoustic simulation of an active exhaust system including the loudspeaker and housing that correlates very well with physical experiments,” said Nicolas Driot, Senior Core Science Engineer for Tenneco. “We are now using simulation to develop our next generation active exhaust system. Simulation will make it possible to evaluate the performance of many alternative design concepts in a minimal amount of time without the expense of building physical prototypes. This should make it possible to improve the performance of the exhaust system beyond what can be achieved with the traditional process where only a few different design alternatives can normally be evaluated. Simulation will also make it possible to bring new products to market faster.”

• Actran results match very closely with physical test measurements both when modeling the loudspeaker alone and then when simulating the loudspeaker integrated it in a complete exhaust system.
• Simulation allows evaluating the performance of many alternative design concepts for active noise cancellation in a minimal amount of time without the expense of building physical prototypes.

As one of the UK’s leading manufacturing companies, Leyland Trucks Ltd. is PACCAR’s established center for light and medium-truck design, development, and manufacture. Leyland used MSC ADAMS to access ride behavior of trucks earlier in the design cycle. In addition to studies of detailed procedures such as cab tilt, lane-change maneuvers, and ride comfort, MSC ADAMS simulation allowed Leyland to rapidly assess the effect of minute changes in suspension, wheelbase, tires, or payload position. For Leyland, the use of VPD tools led to significant benefits in terms of final design quality and considerable time savings.

As design technology has improved, the details of the truck have evolved almost beyond recognition. For instance, new materials have been introduced in recent years, leading to global initiatives to reduce weight through the use of these advanced high-strength steels. Other design details are changing – trucks are now using disc brakes rather than drums – and Leyland engineers must balance incorporating these details while improving quality and still keeping costs under control.

• A full MSC ADAMS truck model contains a flexible body and chassis, springs, roll bars, axles, cab and engine suspension, the steering mechanism, and any frequency dependent rubber mounts. Extra detail, such as brakes, propeller shafts, and out-of-balance engine forces can be included on an ‘as needed’ basis.
• Simulation also allows several aspects of the operation of crane-bodied vehicles to be better understood, such as vehicle stability on slopes and uneven surfaces, the need for stabilizing legs, and the effects of loading and unloading.

• Significant benefit in terms of final design quality,
• considerable time savings
• A recent project named LF was completed two years faster than the previous equivalent one – in a four-year design cycle rather than six.

The amount of effort required to close the doors of an automobile is critical to the consumer’s perception of its quality. If too high a closing velocity is required, the customer may have a negative impression of the car and the potential also exists for an unpleasant noise to be created by closing the door. The goal for most automobile manufacturers is to require a relatively low effort to close the door while at the same time meeting weather sealing and acoustic insulation requirements.

“The results of the cosimulation were provided to our customer and helped win the order to supply seals for a new model vehicle,” said Dr. H. Tuncay Yüksel, Design Director for Standard Profil. “Now that the simulation process has been developed it will be possible to simulate new seal designs in much less time and at a lower cost than physical prototyping. This will make it possible to evaluate more design alternatives to improve door closing performance as well as reduce the time and cost of the product development process.”

• Adams-Marc cosimulation helps the engineers accurately evaluate the amount of effort required to close the doors, which is critical to the consumer’s perception of its quality
• Co-simulation helps MSC customer to win order to supply seals for a new model vehicle
• Users can now simulate new seal designs in much less time and at a lower cost than physical prototyping.

Mechanical joints with fasteners are widely used for aircraft primary structures to assemble composite parts. In the case of a pin-loaded joint, stress concentration takes place on each side of the fastener leading to the apparition of local failure before the final failure of the assembly. Depends on the geometry of the joint, different failure modes may appear.

Although tests are frequently conducted to support the design of such components, the benefits of a simulation tool such as Digimat is obvious if the material modeling used is able to reproduce properly the damage behavior of the composites (unidirectional or woven reinforcement) in order to predict accurately not only the failure load but also the failure mode.

• Definition of the Progressive Failure Material model for both the UD and woven reinforced composite
• Definition of a parameterized MSC MARC finite element model to seamlessly perform a coupled analysis with Digimat.

• Good reproduction of the failure mode for the tested configuration
• Good prediction of the failure load level
• Possibility to investigate any type of geometry with confidence at no cost.

Airframes are designed to deflect in response to aerodynamic and gravitational loads during flight. These deflections in turn load the mechanisms riding on the airframe that move the primary flight control surfaces to maneuver the aircraft. The airframe manufacturer must ensure that deflections of these mechanisms at any point in the flight envelope do not affect their operation. For example, the Airbus A400M elevator is connected to the horizontal tail plane (HTP) with eight hinges that form a straight line when the wing is undeformed. Seven of these hinges are floating hinges which can float in the hinge line direction. When the HTP structure is loaded, it deforms, deforming the hinge line. The multi body simulation (MBS) model here shows the location of hinge 7 which is used to move the elevator, and the drawing below the model shows a cross-section of the hinge. The gap g2 in the drawing allows the red lug to slide on the green pin.

”The replacement of the physical A350- 1000 wing bending test with simulation of the effects of deflection on the flight controls saved Airbus about €3 million and 4 months on the certification process for the A350,” said Michael Vetter, Project Leader Multi-Body Simulation with Airbus. Most of these savings were achieved by eliminating the need to build test fixtures. Similar savings will be achieved for each future aircraft model. Airbus engineers are also working to apply this same method to other mechanical systems of the aircraft such as landing gear and passenger doors.

• Saving significant time and costs by replacing expensive physical testing with Adams simulation
• Removing the limitation on the number of different load cases and configurations that could be tested by physical test rig
• The simulation results successfully correlated with all of the tests
• These results convinced European Aviation Safety Agency(EASA) that functional testing could be replaced with Adams simulation so simulation is used to certify the A350-1000 XWB wing

The primary function of heavy duty trailer suspensions is to link the trailer to its wheels. This provides a compliant connection which protects the trailer cargo from the shock and vibration inputs developed at the road surface. In addition, the suspension must meet the customers’ expectations for usable life, and do so while being economical to manufacture. One of the challenges of trailer suspension design is that these requirements often conflict with each other. Trade-offs are often required in order to meet these performance requirements over the suspension’s entire operating range.

“We can now simulate a new suspension, in a different trailer configuration, for a specific event, in a matter of hours as compared to the days or weeks that are required with physical testing,” Dr. Patterson said. “The fact that we can change the system much faster in the simulation than on an actual trailer makes it possible to evaluate the performance of our product in more configurations, all while spending less time and money building prototypes and performing physical testing. Of course, we always run a final physical test to ensure the accuracy of our simulations. The end result is that we are able to bring products to market faster, and generate larger revenues while reducing our product development expenses.”

• Simulation results make it possible to see every aspect of suspension behavior.
• Adams results match very closely with physical test measurements on numerous occasions comparing the tire loads, component forces, and suspension performance characteristics, such as ride height change.
• Simulation provides a much better understanding of how the proposed suspension design performs than can be obtained by physical testing.
• Loads determined by the simulation are used to design fatigue tests.

The defining characteristic of a zoom lens is that its focal length can be varied. The focal length determines the angle of view — how much of the scene will be captured — and the magnification —how large individual elements will be. The shorter the focal length, the wider the angle of view and the lower the magnification. The advantage of zoom lenses over lenses with a fixed focal length is that you don’t have to change lenses to achieve a tighter or a wider composition. Most zoom lenses, particularly those designed for consumer and professional photographers, lose focus when the focal length is changed. But high-end zoom lenses, especially those designed for producing films or television, can be zoomed in and out without losing focus. This type of lens is called a parfocal lens. The first parfocal lens capable of zooming in an out while maintaining precise focus to a degree acceptable for demanding cinema production was designed and built by Pierre Angénieux in 1956, a feat for which he received an Academy award for technical excellence. Parfocal zoom lenses are very difficult to design and build. Zoom lenses generally consist of three different groups; two of them are moving together (to change focal length) and the last one independently (to focus) and one stationary group of lenses with each group comprising two of more lens elements.

With the new method proven, Ayad simulated all of the company’s zoom lenses and found the worst-case position for each lens. Now inspectors are able to inspect the tilt simply by moving the lens to this position and making the measurements. The net result is that the time needed to inspect each lens has been reduced.

• Inspection time has been reduced
• Less experienced operators can perform the inspection
• Adams simulation accurately predict worst case position

It takes a 450 horsepower truck with an 80,000 lb. load roughly 90 seconds to accelerate to 50 mph but the brakes must be able to stop the truck in less than 5 seconds. Air brakes are used almost exclusively in heavy-duty trucks and trailers because they offer the following advantages. First, the air they run on is free. It only needs to be compressed, cleaned, stored and distributed. The air brake circuit can be easily expanded so trailers can be coupled and uncoupled from it. Besides providing the energy required to stop the vehicle, compressed air also signals when and with how much force the brakes should be applied in any situation. Finally, air brakes can be designed with sufficient fail-safe devices to bring the vehicle safely to a stop, even in the event of an air leak. Reinforced rubber hoses deliver air from fittings on the frame to brake chambers on the axles. In a typical tandem rear suspension there are typically 8 brake hoses plus additional hoses for the power differential lock and other features for a total of 11. The hoses must be routed through a tight space and accommodate the full range of steering gear and suspension travel. The hoses are required to avoid contact with components with sharp edges that might wear the hoses, maintain a specified minimum bend radius to avoid constricting flow within the hose, and avoid axial forces high enough to pull out the hose out of the fitting.

“Simulation makes it possible to try many different positions, orientations, and clipping options early in the design phase prior to the availability of a prototype,” said Stefano Cassara, Manager Vehicle Dynamics Simulation for Navistar. “New design iterations can be evaluated in a small fraction of the time required for physical testing. The new approach makes it possible to design new hose configurations in only about two weeks. Since the design process will be carried out early and outside the critical path we should be able to bring new vehicles to market six weeks faster than in the past. Another advantage of the new approach is that we can model loading scenarios, such as braking, that cannot be duplicated on the test rig.”

• Simulation of hose routing helps reduce time to market by six weeks
• Adams predictions perfectly matched test results in each steering position
• Simulation provides a much better understanding of how to route the braking hoses to avoid contact with components with sharp edges that might wear the hoses in response to suspension and steering movement
• New Adams FE Part provided a fast and accurate way to predict the large deformation of brake hoses in Adams environment

The vast majority of robots are controlled through the use of encoders that measure joint rotation. But even when encoders with very high levels of accuracy are used, the ability of robots to move to an absolute XYZ position and ABC orientation is limited by deflection, thermal expansion and manufacturing variation. Some applications, such as placement of a disk drive read head, require very higher levels of positioning accuracy that can only be achieved with a very expensive, special purpose robot. This challenge is being addressed with visual servoing technology that uses a vision system to acquire an image that determines the relative positions of the robot end-effector and the target.

“The concept of the hidden robot model is a powerful tool able to analyze the intrinsic properties of some controllers developed by the visual servoing community,” Sébastien Briot concluded. “Adams simulations have played an important role in validating our theoretical work on hidden robot models. The integration of Adams with Simulink through Adams/Controls eliminated the need for us to write complex equations for predicting the dynamics of parallel robots and also provided graphical results that gave us a better understanding of robot behavior.”

• Adams simulation accurately predicted position and orientation of the robot.
• Simulation played an important role in validating the theoretical work
• Complex equations are no longer needed to predict the dynamics of parallel robots

Reinforced plastics and composite materials are chosen more and more because of their improved performance regarding damping for NVH applications compared to current metals. Material specialists need to efficiently identify this mechanical characteristic which, like the stiffness and failure, is anisotropic and driven by local fiber orientations in the material’s microstructure. Moreover for NVH purposes, the frequency dependency must be clearly identified in order to provide accurate material models to design engineers.

• Available in < 2 days when using available constituent models
• Quickly evaluate various multiphase materials to identify the best candidates for NVH targets
• Avoid waiting time and unneeded cost of performing additional experimental tests for each candidate material

Discontinuous fiber composites (DFC) are produced by compression molding of prepreg chips which are made of a combination of unidirectional fiber and a Thermoset or ThermoPlastic matrix. In some cases, matrix is made of thermoset which consolidate through a chemical/ cure reaction at elevated temperature. However, when the curing cycle is not well monitored it can be observed some cracks that appear between the chips due to apparition of thermal stresses normal to two chips.

Due to their complex microstructure, these materials request the definition of new dedicated methods in order to capture accurately the local orientation and to compute the local homogenized properties in order to simulate correctly the curing and the design process. Hence, the Digimat platform is used to build a complete methodology to compute these residual stresses and to take them into account during the design cycle of the part.

• Propose a complete methodology to analyze Discontinuous Fiber Composites: Understand the effect of the local microstructure on the behavior of the part.
• Improve the understanding of the effects of the manufacturing cycle parameters: Evaluate the risk fo the apparition of defects between the chips for a given set of parameters of manufacturing (pressure, temperature histories). Though their nature is different, this procedure can be applied for both, thermoset or thermoplastic resin.

Designing lightweight CFRP structures with confidence requires access to allowables values. Allowables generation is extremely time and money consuming. Various layups, coupon tests and environment conditions must be covered for each characterized material system. Each test configuration must be repeated many times to obtain a statistical evaluation of the mechanical property.

Digimat-VA successfully predicted allowable values within 10% error for all cases except the soft open-hole tension scenario. Typical run times for unnotched tests were 3 minutes, while it look less than 10 minutes for open-hole cases.

Laminate T-stiffeners are widely used in the aerospace industry to transfer the 3D complex loads between the stiffeners and the skins. However, the way they are manufactured can affect the inherent properties.

In this case, we have considered that the stiffener and the skin were assembled using an RTM process but because of the poor infiltration of the resin due to the fiber orientation changings, some dry spots appear in the noodle. These dry spots or voids affect the mechanical properties of the noodle and this knock-down of properties must be taken into account during the design process.

With Digimat, effective modeling solution enables to understand the sequence of failure of the structure and the resultant load level. The results allowed to capture the progressive loss of stiffness of the structure and the resulting load.

Omni-Lite Industries is an advanced materials company. They recently designed a new part that was exhibiting a unique material flow. The part was cold formed out of 1100 aluminum material. The manufacturing process for this new part utilized a three-die progression, and was produced on a Nakashimada TH3-6A cold forming machine.

Omni-Lite found that there is a very accurate correlation between the software prediction of material flow and the real-world results from the heading tooling. The results prove that simulation is a very necessary tool to use for cold forming tool design in order to reduce development cost and product development lead time.

• Reduce product development costs
• Reduce time to market by eliminating need for repetitive physical testing
• Very close correlation between physical test results and Simufact simulation results