Desktop Engineering Blog

Article RoundUp 2018

Blog Posts from January to July 2018

ICYMI (In Case You Missed It)

• Adaptive Building Design
  In recent years many papers, both government whitepapers, research document and industry guru’s have voiced concern on the poor productivity within the construction industry.
  
  
• Dropbox and BIM
  Dropbox is used very frequently amongst companies within the construction industry as a mechanism to share information. Its cheap, easy to use and available to synchronise files across many hardware platforms. It is easy to see why it has been taken up by many small, medium and even large organisations to help them manage BIM information on building projects.
  
  
• 3DEXPERIENCE Design Share Collaboration Tool
  In this short video you will see some of the powerful live collaboration tools of the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform in a scenario where two designers are working on different parts within the same product.
  

Design of the V&A Museum, Dundee – Kengo Kuma

Kengo Kuma, a Japanese architect with a body of work that surpasses national boundaries, has made a name for himself with his innovative use of shapes, unique creative voice, and focus on organic materials like wood and bamboo.  From Kuma’s perspective, computerized architecture plays a vital role in making that vision a reality.

Adaptive Building Design

In recent years many papers, both government whitepapers, research document and industry guru’s have voiced concern on the poor productivity within the construction industry.

Comparisons have been made with manufacturing industry where overall productivity has doubled over 20-30 years. So how did that industry achieve such gains and construction didn’t?

2D or not 2D that is the question?

Continuing my theme of Shakespearean references, I
wonder if the bard was prescient foreseeing this question that has been asked many a time by managers when they start design projects?

“Should we do this in 2D, it will be quicker, or should we take the plunge and model it in 3D” – how many times has that been said in the last two decades or so, let alone 400 years?

Dropbox and BIM

Dropbox is used very frequently amongst companies within the construction industry as a mechanism to share information. Its cheap, easy to use and available to synchronise files across many hardware platforms. It is easy to see why it has been taken up by many small, medium and even large organisations to help them manage BIM (Building Information Modeling) information on building projects.

3DEXPERIENCE Design Share Collaboration Tool

REAL-TIME COLLABORATION

In this short video you will see some of the powerful live collaboration tools of the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform in a scenario where two designers (Justin and Alex) are working on different parts within the same product.

Scripting with MSC Apex

In an ideal world every piece of software has a button that does exactly what you want, but in the real world you will find yourself completing repetitive tasks either within a single model or each time to create a model.

Repetitive tasks waste the time of engineers and can lead to errors through lack of attention.  MSC Apex has adopted the Python scripting language with its own extensions in order to make automation of tasks a fairly straightforward thing. 

CATIA Composer with Composite Part Data

In this short video, see how CATIA Composer can import native CATIA V5 Composite parts, and preserve all of the Composite Design and Analysis data for use in creating rich 3D documentation.

A simple example of a CATIA V5 Composite part is used in the video, modelled using the 'Zone Approach' with one main laminate and four thicker, reinforcement laminates. 

Learn how to open and select the CATPart from your file browser and see how it replicates in Composer, with all the geometry included.  You will now have the ability to design and capture multiple scenes (or views) as well as create high quality key-frame based animations. 

Non-uniform Thickness with MSC Apex

Capturing data

If you work with moulded or die cast parts you’ll be familiar with thin shell parts that have tapering thickness due to draft angles.  Capturing this effect in your finite element mesh can be tricky and lead to approximations that might not be comfortable or conservative.  MSC Apex has an auto-assignment feature that will accurately capture and represent the non-uniform shell thickness with remarkably little effort. 

Geometry Manipulation with Apex

Ease of Use

The guiding principle for the development of MSC Apex has been ease of use. Through the intelligent design of an intuitive interface users need no formal  training and can be productive after watching a few short videos.  All the features of the product have both written and video instructions making it easy to learn as well as use.