Process Equipment Update
Expanding the positive impact of CFD software
Doug Kolak reports on the need for engineering knowledge to be captured in an accessible format and shared across organisations irrespective of their geographical location.
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conomic pressures have led to increasing globalisation with engineers, analysts and designers working in different locations around the world (reflecting local economic pressures and skill availability). For example, the availability
of qualified engineers in the East along with the shrinking manufacturing base in the West. This can often lead to information being stored in silos, a major barrier to knowledge sharing which is key to minimising repetitive testing. Internationally, the trend of an ageing engineering
workforce with years of valuable experience means that knowledge attrition is a real concern. This knowledge needs to be captured in an accessible format and shared across organisations irrespective of their geographical location or position in the development cycle. To stay abreast of the CAE software market and also
industry pressures, Flowmaster seeks continual feedback from customers and thought leaders in order to remain at the forefront of both technology and best practise. Openness and interoperability are two of the key drivers in this marketplace. Companies are looking to develop integrated CAE modelling and simulation environments as part of a multi-disciplinary simulation initiative and therefore increasingly look for products that are developed in this way. Flowmaster considered how its computational fluid
dynamics (CFD) software could facilitate greater sharing of data and knowledge to overcome the challenges facing fluid engineers. Software that encompass the following solutions would offer a real advantage to engineers, analysts and designers wherever they are working.
1. Increase the re-use of knowledge – where previous IP has been conceived re-use will decrease costs and development times;
2. Assist Simulation driven design – moving away from simulation validated design, seeking to decrease development times; and
3. Create a knowledge bank – to capitalise on the disparate knowledge held, impacting positively on future development.
Launched earlier this year, the Flowmaster V7 Software Development Kit (SDK) provides customers with a suite of tools to enable Customisation, Extension, Automation and Integration of Flowmaster V7 within product development and product lifecycle processes. This allows customers to integrate their CAE systems and gives them the opportunity to take a multi-disciplinary approach to these processes. These tools are broken down into:
n Technology: (Script Editors (Macros, Scripts and Plug-ins); APIs (.NET and COM); XML Schemas.
n Documentation – Guides for implementation along with Code; Analytical Models; Scripting Controllers; Automation Macros.
n Training.
Data Management Data has to be collected from many different suppliers along with departments within BAE SYSTEMS. Once acquired, some data required translation to ‘modelling units’.
Fig. 1. Openness and interoperability are CAE key drivers.
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