STAR-Works V4.14 Simulates Flow Inside of SolidWorks

By DE Editors

CD-adapco (New York and London) unveiled its latest version of STAR-Works at SolidWorks World 2008, held January 20-23 in San Diego. STAR-Works V4.14 allows designers working in the SolidWorks design environment to perform fluid-flow and heat-transfer analyses quickly and easily.

Since it is an integrated solution, STAR-Works presents CFD functionality as an uncomplicated set of menus within SolidWorks. Further, full associativity with the model is maintained throughout the simulation process because the CFD solution becomes an integral part of the SolidWorks CAD model. Thus, any design changes made in response to simulation results are reflected in the solution almost immediately.

Developed after consultation with its industrial users, STAR-CAD Series V4.14 introduces a number of modeling enhancements. Of particular note is the introduction of a periodic boundary condition that is particularly useful for turbomachinery simulation, allowing users to exploit rotational symmetry of a problem by simulating a representative wedge rather than the full geometry.

STAR-Works 4.14 is specifically developed for design and project engineers. Transparent terminology and intelligent parameter selection, says CD-adapco, allow engineers to concentrate on evaluating results and optimizing designs. For instance, users can evaluate what-if design scenarios quickly and easily, ultimately resulting in improved designs and faster-to-market capability, the company says.

STAR-Works, which is built on STAR-CCM+ V2.10, CD-adapco’s latest solver technology, is part of the STAR-CAD Series, which also includes products for CATIA V5, NX, and Pro/ENGINEER.

STAR-CAD Series V4.14 also allows users to specify the velocity at an inlet boundary condition using a cylindrical local co-ordinate system, which is useful for prescribing inflow condition in turbo-chargers and compressors.

Contours of total pressure through the ventilator, predicted by STAR-Works.

“A recent survey of CD-adapco customers revealed that 88 percent of our users perform CFD analysis at the very earliest stages of the engineering design process,”  said Jean-Claude Ercolanelli, CD-adapco’s VP of Product Management. “63 percent of our users routinely use our tools as part of their iterative design process,  analyzing new design variants as soon as the designer creates them.”

CD-adapco says STAR-Works 4.14’s polyhedral cells capability has been proven to deliver more accurate results and faster than traditional high-level meshing schemes. The company further notes that polyhedral meshing enables STAR-Works to automatically mesh complex geometries without the inaccuracies of tetrahedra. CD-adapco also says that testing of its polyhedra have shown convergence rates up to 10 times faster than a comparable tetrahedral meshes. Another benefit cited is the flexibility of being able to use arbitrary polyhedral cells, which is said to make meshing complex geometries trivial — unlike hexahedral meshers, which require extensive user intervention. According to CD-adapco, comparisons demonstrate polyhedra’s numerical properties provide better accuracy than tetrahedral meshes and with fewer cells and less memory consumption.

Contours of total pressure through the ventilator, predicted by STAR-Works.

Users of STAR-Works 4.14 can run simple menus or a simulation wizard from within SolidWorks to set up simulations of laminar and turbulent flow, thermal load, conjugate heat transfer, rotating machinery, compressible and incompressible flow, and porous materials. Meshing is accomplished at the click of a button. Since the mesh is created directly from the original CAD model, no export is necessary and there is no need to clean any CAD.

STAR-Works stores the boundary conditions and mesh within the CAD part, making this data fully accessible to downstream users. This also enables users to enter flow data to their PDM solutions, which, in turn, makes the STAR-Works solution results accessible and traceable throughout the design process.

CD-adapco augments STAR-Works 4.14 with a 3D results viewer. With the viewer, you can send an interactive result file to third parties at no extra cost to you or them. Recipients can zoom, pan, and translate their way around the flow results. They can also integrate the data into a MS PowerPoint presentation to deliver results directly to managers or clients.

In an initiative consistent with CD-adapco’s goal of transferring CAE expertise to its partners, the company has compiled and made available Best Practices Guidelines that offer directions on how to use CAD tools to get suitable models for flow and thermal simulations. Plus,  while the Best Practices Guidelines use the STAR-CAD Series for demonstration purposes, its hints and tips are applicable to any simulation process.

Click here to read why DE’s Editors made this a Pick of the Week.

Click here for more information on STAR-Works.

Click here to access “10 Reasons to Choose STAR-Works.”

Click here to view webinar dates.

Click here to register for STAR-CAD Series Best Practices Guidelines.

Click here to request a demo CD from CD-adapco.

Click here for more information on the STAR-CAD series.

Click here to read a case study, “STAR-Works Helps VIASYS Healthcare to Breathe Easier.”

Click here to read “STAR-Design: Intuitive flow and thermal simulation for Design.