SS-T: 4045 Structural Thermal Transient Analysis

Learn how to create a structural analysis linked to a thermal transient analysis in SimSolid.

Purpose
SimSolid performs meshless structural analysis that works on full featured parts and assemblies, is tolerant of geometric imperfections, and runs in seconds to minutes. In this tutorial, you will do the following:
  • Create a structural analysis linked to a thermal transient analysis
Model Description
The following model file is needed for this tutorial:
  • Structual-ThermalTransient.ssp


Figure 1.
The model (.ssp) file has the following specifications:
  • Material is set to Steel
  • Transient thermal analysis with flux and convection is created

Open Project

  1. Start a new SimSolid session.
  2. On the main window toolbar, click Open Project .
  3. In the Open project file dialog, choose Structural-ThermalTransient.ssp
  4. Click OK.

Review Model

  1. In the Project Tree, expand Transient thermal 1 analysis.
  2. Expand the Thermal conditions branch and review the loads.


    Figure 2.
  3. Click (Results plot) and choose Temperature.
  4. Click Play Animate to view the temperature plot for the time span.

Create Transient Analysis

  1. On the main window toolbar, select Structural > Structural Thermal.
    Tip: You can also right-click on an existing thermal transient analysis and select Create linked analysis > Structural thermal.
    The new analysis appears in the Project Tree.
  2. In the Thermal load window, select Link to Thermal analysis results.
    Transient thermal analysis is automatically selected in the dialog.
    Note: If more than one analysis is present, manually choose the thermal analysis from the Thermal analysis with a result section.


    Figure 3.
  3. In the Time steps section, click Uniform.
  4. In the dialog, set the number of time steps to 50.
    The time span is equally split into 50 steps and listed in the time steps section.
  5. Click OK to define the thermal load.

Define Immovable Support

  1. On the Analysis Workbench, click (Immovable support).
  2. In the dialog, verify the Faces radio button is selected.
  3. In the modeling window, select the faces as highlighted in orange.


    Figure 4.
  4. Click OK.

Run Analysis

  1. On the Project Tree, open the Analysis Workbench.
  2. Click (Solve).

Review Combined Result

  1. On the Analysis Workbench toolbar, click (Results plot).
  2. Select Displacement Magnitude.
    The Legend and the Time History dialogs appears in the modeling window.
  3. Click (Show history graph) to view a plot of the displayed response history.
  4. Click (Animate history) to animate the time history step by step.
    Tip: You can change the speed of the animation by increasing/decreasing the value in the Animation speed box.
    Note: Make sure the Show deformed shape function is activated when animating the history.
  5. Close all results dialogs.

View Reactions

  1. On the Analysis Workbench toolbar, click the (Reaction/contact force).
  2. In the Supports tab, select Immovable 1.
  3. For Reactions, select Force Magnitude from the drop-down menu.
  4. Click Evaluate.
    A plot appears showing the reaction force magnitude at Immovable 1 at each timestep.
  5. Optional: Click Save to save the plot as an image or the data as a text file.