| DRAG | -5.13% |
| DESIGNS | 36 |
| TIME | 15 MIN |
In Computer Aided Engineering a geometry has to have a mathematical definition in order for any type of physics or engineering computation to be performed. These definitions are known as meshes. The computer aided engineering term for aerodynamic calculation is computational fluid dynamics, or CFD for short. A CFD mesh is an extremely large mesh, often taking many days and weeks to create. Sculptor™ performs complex deformations to the CFD mesh in real-time, removing the need to create a new mesh every time a different geometry is tested in CFD.
By parameterizing the deformations based on an arbitrary volume a computer can make thousands of new designs in the time it would take to make one new mesh. These new
Sculptor™, enabled the deformation and optimization of this example geometry. The goal was to reduce drag by deforming the windscreen and front fairing of this 10 million cell CFD model. 36 models were analyzed, Sculptor created all of these models in 15 minutes. Without Sculptor these would have taken 40 hours to create. After the CFD analysis a geometry was found that reduced the drag by more than 5%
Using Arbitrary Shape Deformation (ASD) volumes, different configurations were instantly tested, without the need of re-creating the mesh. 36 different geometries were tested and one was found that reduced the drag by more than 5%.
8 Control groups were defined with individual deformation vectors based on manufacturing constraints and realistic aerodynamic estimations. These groups were used as design variables in the setup of the optimization
Sculptor™'s morphing technology combined with the 8 control groups was applied over the Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) model of the motorcycle. Using the optimizer to determine which configurations should be tested, Sculptor took 15 minutes to generate 36 designs. These designs were then automatically sent to the CFD code and analyzed.
Sculptor™, coupled with a CFD code, allowed finding the optimal aerodynamic design in a few days, while CFD only would have taken several weeks. The total costs were 79% less with respect to the traditional design method. In the table below the breakdown of the costs is presented, based on the estimation of man-hour cost of ($90 / hour), CFD code hourly cost ($10.75 / hour) and a Sculptor™ hourly cost of ($10.75 / hour). 80 designs needed to be evaluated.
Sculptor™ is developed by Optimal Solutions Software LLC, based in Idaho, USA. The Optimal Solutions Management team is comprised of some of the most experienced CFD-based shape optimization personnel in the business. Since 1990, the re-search team has expended thousands of man-hours in design-ing and refining the Sculptor™ software program to its pre-sent form. Through the development of the Sculptor™ world-class, patent-pending product family, Optimal Solutions has been able to effectively address the current barriers that pre-vent the efficient use of digital simulation.
The team at Optimal Solutions Software is happy to perform a no-cost initial design assessment on your model. Contact us today and we will obtain the deformation constraints from you and demonstrate how Sculptor can save you time and money. We have worked with all sizes of companies and have NDA's in place with most major firms and can quickly get to work on your model.
Sculptor enabled optimization of the HVAC design resulting in significantly improved performance with an 89 % time savings and a 90% cost savings to the customer as compared to other methods.
Sculptor enabled an 8% increase of overall lift/drag ratio, a 90 % time savings, and a 91% cost savings to the customer as compared to other methods.
Sculptor enabled optimization of the aerodynamic design with a 90 % time savings and as compared to other methods.
Sculptor enabled the customer to match "hot" turbine blade models to "cold" shape with a 62 % time savings and a 62% cost savings to the customer when compared to other methods.
Sculptor enabled optimization of the high speed train design resulting in reduced drag, reduced emissions and improved efficiencies with an 85 % time savings and a 92% cost savings to the customer as compared to other methods.
Sculptor enabled evaluation of 124 design variants with an 86 % time savings and an 86% cost savings to the customer when compared to other methods.
Sculptor enabled quick evaluation of multiple design alternatives resulting in reduced drag with a 79% cost savings to the customer as compared to other methods.
Scultpor enabled finding the optimal vehicle aerodynamic design with 89 % time savings and an 81% cost savings to the customer when compared to other methods.
