Package optimised for machine tool design

Samtech has released the first industrial version of Samcef for Machine Tools, its professional solution for the design, analysis and optimisation of machine tools.

Samtech has released the first industrial version of Samcef for Machine Tools, its professional solution for the design, analysis and optimisation of machine tools.

Samcef for Machine Tools offers a unique environment for the mechanical design and detailed mechatronic verification of machine tools, from simple rigid multi-body simulations (MBS) to check the global kinematics of the machine tool to very detailed verifications using finite element analysis (FEA) techniques on the dynamic behaviour of the machine tool interacting with its controllers.

This new computer aided engineering tool is completely based on CAD geometries defined locally or imported from well-known CAD systems.

It has been under development since 2001 from the Samtech software platform and will be presented soon by the company at Micad 2004.

The user environment of Samcef for Machine Tools is the CAD-based pre- and postprocessor Samcef Field.

This stand-alone user-friendly environment allows the complete graphical modelling of a machine tool, as well as the choice of modelling complexity and of the analysis type from the same data definition completely based on geometry.

Using Samcef for Machine Tools, designers can chose the appropriate mechanical modelling of the machine tool depending on the progress of the design.

The mechanical model can contain a description of all the parts (bodies) and the connection devices (joints) of the machine tool.

Different modelling levels may be chosen, depending on the objectives of the analysis, not only for bodies (rigid bodies, beam, shell, volume FE models, super-elements) but also for joints (ideal kinematical joints with or without friction laws, flexible sliders, ball screw elements, linear motors, contact/friction conditions).

In order to connect the controllers to the mechanical model, "sensors" can be defined to measure inputs of controllers and "actuators" sending back the outputs of the controllers to the mechanical model.

Finally, different types of mechanical analyses are accessible from the same modelling environment: rigid multi-body simulation (Samcef Mecano); linear static FE analysis; linear modal FE analysis; nonlinear structure FE analysis with interaction conditions between deformable bodies; creation, use and restitution of super-elements; rigid multi-body simulation with super-elements; multi-body simulation with rigid bodies, flexible bodies (meshed or reduced into super-elements) and interaction conditions between deformable bodies; linear structure FE analyses on a linearised configuration coming from non-linear analysis; and parametric analysis, statistical analysis, optimisation and design of experiments applied to the previous analyses.

"In the machine tool industrial sector, the importance of numerical simulations using finite element method is growing.

The goal pursued is to predict the true dynamic behaviour of the machines interacting with their drives (ball screws, rack-and-pinion, linear motors).

The numerical computation clearly helps avoiding expensive iterations during the design process and guarantees a better precision and thus an higher quality of our products", said Mani Ghassempouri, Development Manager at Comau Systemes France.

"Samcef for Machine Tools is currently the best solution available on the market, far away from other existing commercial numerical simulation technologies.

It covers all the computation needs of the machine tool designer from very simple analyses to the prediction of the complete nonlinear dynamic behaviour of the machine tool".

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