Instructions MT5081-01A FEM with SIMULATION The Finite Element Method

In this exercise we will see how to use SolidWorks and SolidWorks Simulation to make structural mechanics calculations for a part. You dont need knowledge of structural mechanics. I will try to explain the basics as we go along. The first thing to do is to check that SolidWorks Simulation really works. Start a new part, use Tools, Add-Ins .., there you should find SolidWorks Simulation. Check it, OK. If you dont find this, maybe you have had problems during installation. If so contact me. If it works you should see a new tab below the Command Manager. 1. We will examine a flat bar with a pulling force, so start by drawing a rectangle in the Right plane with the dimensions 50x8, with the origin in the middle of the rectangle. Then use Extrude Midplane 420. 2. Chose material Plain Carbon Steel. Save the model in a new folder FEM as Flat bar. This bar will be exerted to a force of 20 kN (equal to the weight of 2 ton) on the end surfaces. Working with FEM, its very common to reduce the size of the model by using symmetry. The flat bar is symmetric in all three planes (Top, Front and Right), so we can cut the model in these planes and be left with just an eighth of the bar. 3. Chose an isometric view of the bar. Mark the Front plane in the Feature Manager. Take Insert, Features, Split and take Cut Part and point at the left side of the bar. Check the square in front of Consume cut bodies at the bottom. OK. Repeat the procedure with the Right plane and remove the front half. Finally take away the bottom half by using Split with the Top plane. Save the model again. It is now ready for FEM calculations. 4. Pick the Simulation tab and you will find Study Advisor at the far left. Below is the command New Study.We will make a study of how the bar behaves being pulled at both ends by the force. A window appears where you can chose what kind of study you want to do. As you can see there is a lot of alternatives to chose from, but we will only use the most common, which is a static study with Solid Mesh. Static should already be

marked so just take OK. (If you are interested in learning more about FEM there is a distance course MT5081 to apply for.) 5. Under the Feature Manager Study1 will appear. You can see that the material is entered from the model. Below we have Connections, Fixtures and External Loads. Right click on Fixtures and chose Fixed Geometry. Take Advanced below and chose Symmetry. Then pick the three symmetry surfaces, i.e. the three faces where we made the splits. (The three faces that meet in the origin.)

7. Now the model is locked in position in all three directions (this would have been difficult to do without splitting the bar). To add the force, rotate the model and pick the other end surface. Right click on External Loads and chose Force. Chose Normal Force, change the direction if needed and set the value to 5000 N. (This is only one fourth of the original end surface.) (If my arrows are bigger than yours, its because Ive changed the settings to get better pictures.) 8. Now the bar is locked in position and the load is placed, so right click on Symmetry-1 and Force -1 and chose Hide, so we dont have to see them. Now its time to divide the model into a big number of small regions. These are the Finite Elements (finite means that the regions are not infinitely small). The command is called Mesh. The regions (elements) can be of different kinds, but we will use solids, that look like more or less deformed tetrahedral elements. In each of the four corners and on the midpoints of the six edges the element will be attached to nearby elements. These points are called nodes. Each node can move in three directions (x-, y- and z-directions). This

tetrahedral element has a total of 10 nodes, and so 30 degrees of freedom (DOF). Some of these will be defined by the Restraints we have put on the model.

9. Right click on Mesh and chose Create Mesh. The program will recommend a size for the elements, which will give a mesh that is neither too coarse nor too fine. Often starting with a coarse mesh will make the calculations quicker. So go to Mesh Parameters and set the size to 4 mm. OK. 10. When the meshing is done (should go pretty quick) right click on Mesh and chose Details. Now you should see the following (or close to): Number of nodes: 5718, which should mean some 15000 DOF:s as some of the nodes are locked in position Number of elements: 3075 Maximum Aspect Ratio is the ratio between the longest and shortest side in an element. The perfect mesh would have the ratio 1, meaning that all sides are equal, but that is never the case. We can see that 98.5 % of the elements have an Aspect ratio les than 3, and no element have more than10. The next line tells us that no element is too distorted (e.g. turned inside out). This mesh is fully acceptable. 10. Now its time for the calculations. Right click on Study1 and chose Properties. Check that FFEPlus is chosen. This is the solver that normally works best. If you have problems with this, you can sometime try Direct sparse. Check that the Results folder is a folder on your hard disc drive. If you have e.g. opened a part from an USB stick, the program will try to place the calculations there. This might take long time and the memory may not be big enough. Take OK. 11. Right click again on Study1 and chose Run. Now the program will start to calculate the displacements of all the nodes. The number of DOF:s is close to 17000, which means that the program is solving 17000 equations with 17000 variables. (Before there were computers this meant hard work!) Down under Results you find Stress, Displacement and Strain (if they are not there, right click on Results and chose Define Stress plot). Now to the most difficult how to interpret the results. 12. You will see a colorful picture, but we will make some changes before we look at it, right click on Stress1 and chose Edit Definition. Change VON to SX and change the units from N/m^2 to N/mm^2 (MPa=megapascal). OK. It may seem that the picture didnt change much, but now we will look at it. SX is the stress in the x-direction (I hope the model is oriented so that this is the direction along the bar.) and we can see that the maximum stress is 50.1 N/mm2. The lowest is 49.8 MPa, which means that the tension is around 50 MPa everywhere. This is how the force is divided over the cross section of the bar. F=20 000 N and A=50x8=400 mm2 give the stress Sx = 20000/400=50 N/mm2.

12. If you change SX for SY and then to SZ (mark the pin and the window will stay open when you take OK), you can see that the stresses across the bar are almost equal to zero. The same goes for the so called shear stresses TXY, TXZ and TYZ. If you go on choosing P1 (First principal stress) it will look very much like SX, because that is the only stress with a significant value. P2 och P3 should be close to zero. VON (von Mises stress) looks like SX again as does INT (stress intensity). If you chose ERR (Energy error norm), you can estimate how good your model and meshing are. I have a maximum value of 0.1, which means 0.1 % error, a very small value. If you open Advanced Options in the window, you will see that changing to ERR, the program automatically changed the settings so that ERR is shown for the elements in stead of the nodes. 13. Now we will look at Displacements. (Click on the pin and then OK). Double click on Displacement1. Right click and chose Edit Definition. Chose UX and mm with Deformed Shape: Automatic. OK. The red end is fixed by the symmetry restraint and does not move, while the blue, where the force is pulling, move -0,05 in the x direction. Observe the direction of the x-axis and you see that this end will be pulled out 0.05 mm. This means that the whole bar will be 0.1 mm longer. A good way to look at stresses and displacements is to use Animate. Right click on Displacement1 and chose Animate. Take Stop and change the number of frames from 5 to 10 and then hit Play. In the drawing area you can see that the deformation scale is 420 to make the deformations clearly visible. Now look at UZ. The side that is not fixed will move 1,67 10-3 mm towards the middle (see the Z-axis in the coordinate system). The width of the flat bar will thus be 3,33 10-3 mm less.

14. We will now look at the third kind of Results: Strain. Look at EPSX (change Advanced Options to Node Values if needed). This has a constant value of 2.38 10-4 (no unit). What is this? Well it is the ratio between the displacement UX and the length (really for every element). In our case the bar got 0.1 mm longer, and its length is 420 mm. 0.1 / 420=2.38 10-4. If we look at EPSZ we get 6.6 10-5 = 3.33 10-3 / 50. If we look at the ratio EPSZ to EPSX, it will be 6.6 / 23,8 = 0,28. The ratio SX to EPSX will be 50 / 2,38 10-4= 210 000 MPa. Both 0,28 and 210000 MPa are material properties. 15. Right click on Plain Carbon Steel in the Feature Manager and chose Edit Material. Look at Properties and change units to N/mm^2 (MPa). Here you will find the elastic modulus E=210 000 N/mm2 and Poissons ratio n=0,28. E is the ratio between stress and strain, and tells us how little elastic a material is. If you look at Rubber, which is much more elastic, the E value is much less, 6.1 N/mm2. n is the ratio between the strain perpendicular to the force and the strain along the force (really there should be a minus sign also, as one will be positive and the other negative). If the steel bar extends 1 pro mille in the direction of the force, at the same time it gets 0.28 pro mille thinner. 16. Further down you can see for Plain Carbon Steel: Tensile strength 400 N/mm2. This is the limit where the material will break. We had 50 N/mm2. This means that we have a factor of security of 8 against the material limit. The force could be eight times greater before the bar breaks. Further down is the Yield strength 220 MPa. This means that at stresses over 220 MPa the material will stop acting as an elastic material, and the

deformations will be permanent. As long as the forces are below the Yield limit, the deformations will go away if the load is removed. Therefore it is common in design, to choose a safety factor against the Yield limit. In our case the factor of safety is 220/50 = 4.4. If this is a small or a big safety factor, depends on where the bar will be used, and also on how sure we can be of the force 20 kN. If the bar will be used in an elevator, a safety factor like this can be defended, but the bar could be made smaller and cheaper if its used in a place, where a failure does not have severe consequences. 17. Too many words. Lets go back and make a hole in the flat bar to see what happens.