In a Recent product demo, Altair showed off the improvements to their simplified pre- and post-processing tool, SimLab 14.0. This CAD and solver-neutral program is designed to make it easier for analysts to prepare their geometry and finite element mesh and then process the results into various charts.
SimLab 14.0 Is All About That Mesh: No Cleanup
SimLab offers meshing with automated cleanup. Image courtesy of Altair.
“One of the important things about SimLab is you don’t need to do any CAD cleanup,” said Gunaseelan Krishnasamy, co-founder and senior director of SimLab, which was acquired by Altair in 2010.
“When you bring in a CAD from elsewhere, we take care of the cleanup during the meshing,” he added. “Users don’t need to do much. We find all the features that are an issue and merge or collapse the ones that will cause an issue during the mesh.”
However, users still have a lot of control over their mesh. For instance, they can dictate how many elements will be needed across material thicknesses or along fillets and cylinders that are automatically flagged by the program.
Additionally, by defining a minimal element size, the user will also inform the program which elements will be collapsed or merged by the meshing process. Anything too small to be captured by the minimal mesh size will not make the cut unless the user flags it as important.
“If an analyst wants to preserve a feature, they can specify it be retained and where there should be a finer mesh,” explained Krishnasamy.
Users can also define contacts, such as where nuts and bolts will be placed in the design. If you tell SimLab you want washers at a location, then it will mesh accordingly. You don’t need to break up the geometry or add artificial features to ensure proper meshing in the area. This predefined mesh control will save a lot of time. Additionally, as the design is modified, the local mesh is automatically updated, saving even more time.
SimLab Is a Template-Driven Tool
Template options for automating your pre and post processing. Image courtesy of Altair.
Some templates users can create to automate SimLab include:
- How a part will be connected to other parts
- How the model is meshed
- How loads and boundary conditions will be defined
- How the results will be post processed
- Solver setup
Furthermore, if a user were to link a solver directly into SimLab, the various template functionalities can be used in conjunction with macros to completely automate the process. The right setup can completely run on its own, from the import of the CAD to the analysis of the final results.
Some of SimLab’s post-processing capabilities (which can also be automated via templates) include:
- Bore distortion
- Frequency response
- Strain gauge
- Hot spots
- Topology optimization
- Free shape optimization
“Repeatability of using the parameter settings is a key feature of SimLab when using templates,” said Nirmalkumar Subbaiah, program manager of SimLab at Altair. “Templates store all the parameters you need to use and applies them to a new part. It gives SimLab a process flow and helps to achieve repeatability and consistency so everyone will come up with the same mesh.”
SimLab 14.0 Has a New GUI
The new SimLab interface is reminiscent of solidThinking Inspire's framework.
Image courtesy of Altair.
“We are built on the same framework as [Hyperworks and] solidThinking Inspire,” said Krishnasamy, “we even reused some of the icons.”
Krishnasamy explains that just as this interface makes topology optimization easier for designers, the interface will make SimLab’s pre and post processing easier for analysts.
“SimLab 14.0 represents a first step in the transition to the new HyperWorks user experience. We feel the learnability and efficiency have been significantly improved while maintaining very familiar workflows for the experienced users,” said James Dagg, CTO at Altair.
With every change in a user interface there will be some backlash from the core audience. However, early adopters that have been using SimLab 14.0’s beta have had positive reactions to the software.
Take David Trimboli, product development group at Chrysler. Altair reports that after 20 minutes of playing with the beta, he emailed them and said, “It was clear to me that your team put a lot of thought into the new interface. I was able to replicate my processes within a few minutes. I was also impressed with the degree of change. You changed the icons, but not the look and feel of the actual operators.”
Altair suspects that for some it might take a few hours to half a day of training to learn the new SimLab. However, the development team deserves some praise for one tool, which will make the interface transition from version 13.3 and 14.0 easier — the mapping tool from the help menu.
If you know the name of the tool you want to use and you can’t find it, the mapping tool will tell you where it is in SimLab 14.0 versus 13.3. Alternatively, if the name of the tool is at the tip of your tongue, you can use the mapping tool to search the SimLab 13.3 functional tree to discover where the tool is listed in 14.0.
Every developer that releases a new user interface of their product should include a tool similar to SimLab’s mapping tool. It is a disservice to your user base to assume they will understand the new interface instantly. Just because the tool is easier to use and more efficient for new users, doesn’t mean those using it for decades will welcome a massive UI overhaul.
To learn more about what is new in SimLab 14.0, watch this video:
Other improvements to SimLab 14.0 include:
- Japanese language support
- Redesigned dialogs
- Solver interface improvements
- Unified interface for both Windows and Linux
- Mac version expected next year