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System Simulation

The Ultimate Arbiter of Product Performance

It All Comes Down to the System!

In the end, it all comes down to the system performance of a given system or systems of systems. The components may be optimized, but if the system architecture is wrong, or your control software is buggy, the product will flop.  Simulation is the perfect tool for system design and system verification and validation.Here, you’ll access the latest news, articles, presentations, videos, webinars, and success stories related to system simulation

  • Open Standards

    Open standards enable innovation. Systems need standards in order to connect models from different domains into the cyber-physical system. Check out the Modelica language and the FMI Standard.

  • Cyber-Physics

    An ever larger value in a product comes from software. It can be for controls, autonomy, or in the cloud as part of the Internet of Things. For mobility, the leading software stack is AUTOSAR.
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  • Model-Based Systems Engineering for Aircraft Engines

    Modelon’s newest library, the Jet Propulsion Library, provides the foundation for modeling and simulating jet engines along with the integrated model-based systems engineering of aircraft systems.

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    The prime mover of an aircraft, the jet engine, is one of the most important subsystems of an aircraft. Jet engines provide primary power (thrust) and secondary power (to drive flight control, air conditioning, cabin lighting, etc.) to the aircraft. Performance and efficiency improvements are becoming increasingly difficult to achieve when focusing on the engine in isolation. In the past, engine improvements have largely been developed separately in incremental design cycles – these cycles have not considered the need to develop the total aircraft package as an entire unit. Today, aeronautical systems and their subsystems are becoming more and more integrated and therefore simulation models need to become further aligned to meet performance and efficiency needs.

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  • Less is more: MBSE for unified model representation in simulation

    Unified model representation enhances knowledge-capture efficiency across multiple disciplines

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    Using simulation in product development is nothing new. There are many simulation tools that help users solve practical issues.

    Beyond achieving success with important singular issues, engineers and their companies have been trying to achieve a global solution at a system level.  This type of solution encompasses subsystems or components from domains such as mechanical, electrical, thermal and controls, and includes embedded software.

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  • System Simulation in a heterogeneous World

    The arrival of the Functional-Mockup-Interface (FMI) has been a game changer by simplifying the combination of models from different tools.

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    Most of us know by now that there is not one single software tool that will solve all our simulation needs. Even if we narrow it down to system simulation, we will not find that One tool.

    Not so long ago, handling different aspects of product design with separate tools was not a major problem.  But as competitive pressure builds to get products to market faster, the game is changing.

    A major key to success is being able to integrate subsystems into system simulations early in the design process. This enables organizations to understand and assess system behavior, as opposed to component or subsystem behavior, to avoid flaws that become costly to correct in later stages.

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  • Integrating Executable Requirements to Accelerate Design Iterations

    Executable requirements speed up the system level verification and validation process

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    This blog promotes the idea of connecting MBSE and MBD more seamlessly than was previously possible. Using recent results from the ITEA3 EU project MODRIO, a Modelica Library prototype to represent executable requirements is now available, and we have used this library to demonstrate the workflow to develop a simplified version of a vehicle thermal management control system to reduce fuel consumption.

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  • Analysis Template Development at NASA Langley

    Achieving safe, robust, and feasible Democratization at NASA Langley Research Center.

    Solution Providers:

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    From the CAASE 18 conference, this presentation outlines NASA Langley’s Democratized Simulation implementation and how challenges were overcome with intelligent templates.

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  • Reviewing Architecture-Based Approaches for Vehicle Modeling

    The Modelica language offers first class support for representing system architecture in models. This enables both architecture exploration and the development of product families.

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    All Modelon libraries are developed to adhere to the open-standard, Modelica language. We, at Modelon, thrive in this language standard for many reasons and fully leverage it in the use of templates and model architectures to rapidly create models and model variants. Modelon’s Vehicle Dynamics Library utilizes this template-based approach in full vehicle modeling. There is even the VehicleInterfaces library that attempts to provide common interfaces for use in vehicle simulation

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  • What is FMI?

    FMI stands for Functional Mock-up Interface. It is an open standard for exchanging dynamical simulation models between different tools in a standardized format.

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    FMI stands for Functional Mock-up Interface. It is an open standard for exchanging dynamical simulation models between different tools in a standardized format.

    The value of model-based development and investment in a simulation model portfolio increases tremendously when the models can be reused in different contexts.

    The FMI standard specifies an open format for exporting and importing simulation models. This means that you can select the tool best suited for each type of analysis while keeping the same model. You can also share your model with colleagues who can reuse it for other purposes, using tools that match their needs, skills, and preferences.

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  • Understanding the FMI Flavors: CS v. ME

    The Functional Mockup INterface comes in two flavors: model exchange and co-simulation. This blog explains the differences

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    The Functional Mock-up Interface (FMI) standard supports two flavors of Functional Mock-up Units (FMUs), including: Co-Simulation (CS) and Model Exchange (ME). But, do you know the difference?

    As an expert in the standard it’s my goal to help users understand the commonalities and differences – getting you to a point in which you’re choosing the best possible technique to achieve your goal! Let’s first look at what the two kinds of FMUs have in common.

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  • Using an Intelligent Template to Analyze a Complex Optical System

    This NASA Langley case study demonstrates how and why a simulation template was used to aid in the analysis and design of a complex space-borne electro-optical sensor.

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    Structural-Thermal-Optical-Performance (STOP) Model Development and Analysis of a Field-widened Michelson Interferometer

    An integrated Structural-Thermal-Optical-Performance (STOP) model was developed for a field-widened Michelson interferometer which is being built and tested for the High Spectral Resolution Lidar (HSRL) project at NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC). The performance of the interferometer is highly sensitive to thermal expansion, changes in refractive index with temperature, temperature gradients, and deformation due to mounting stresses. Hand calculations can only predict system performance for uniform temperature changes. An integrated STOP Simulation Template was developed to automate and investigate the effects of design modifications on the performance of the interferometer in detail, including CTE mismatch, and other three- dimensional effects.

    The STOP Template was developed using the Comet SimApp Authoring Workspace which performs automated integration between Pro-Engineer®, Thermal Desktop®, MSC Nastran™, SigFit™, Code V™, and MATLAB®. This is the first flight project for which LaRC has utilized Comet, and it allows a larger trade space to be studied in a shorter time than would be possible in a traditional STOP analysis. This paper describes the development of the STOP Template, presents a comparison of STOP results for simple cases with hand calculations, and presents results of the correlation effort to bench-top testing of the interferometer. A trade study conducted with the STOP model which demonstrates a few simple design changes that can improve the performance seen in the lab is also presented.

    This paper was published in the 2014 Conference Proceedings of the SPIE.

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  • Altair’s Open-Architecture Integrated CAE Platform Supports Conceptual and Systems Design

    Engineering.com's Shawn Wasserman writes about Conceptual and Systems Design Fuels Open-Architecture Integrated CAE.

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    There is a need to bring simulation into conceptual design. And not just any simulation, but multiphysics and systems level simulations. By conducting these assessments earlier, teams are able to catch errors early in the design cycle. This will help to reduce costly changes to the design if prototypes were to fail.

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  • Rapid Concept Engineering at The Aerospace Corp.

    In this article, published in 2012 as an MSC Partner Showcase, Don Tolle, now at CIMdata, describes how Comet’s Intelligent Templates are used at the Aerospace Corp., to rapidly perform STOP (integrated Structural/Thermal/Optics) analysis using the platform’s Abstract Modeling techniques.

    Solution Providers:

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    The long desired goal of simulation driven design has been to enable engineering analysts to focus on achieving the product’s functional requirements starting early in the R&D cycle. By putting simulation analysts in control of the “engineering geometry” starting at the conceptual design stage, reusing CAE best practices, and automating highly manual and repetitive

    design simulation tasks, performance simulation results can finally drive critical new product development decisions.

    As Dr. David Thomas (Engineering Team Lead, The Aerospace Corporation) commented, “The Comet-enabled integrated STOP process allowed our interdisciplinary engineering team to conduct an analysis that normally takes several days or weeks to perform to be completed in a single day. These savings are realized for each design cycle in the iterative process needed to converge to a satisfactory overall design for the IR telescope.”

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      • GDLS Achieves Early Simulation using Simulation Automation Platform

        In this 2008 case study whitepaper, Bruce Jenkins interviews senior engineer Mike Patterson at General Dynamics Land Systems, about their use of the Comet simulation automation and Abstract Modeling technology to bring simulation upfront.

        Solution Providers:

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        How to bring simulation earlier in the product design process has been discussed for years but few have been able to overcome the technical and work-process barriers to doing so. General Dynamics Land Systems (GDLS) has launched a process where automation through templates with abstract modeling technology creates a seamless modeling/simulation process. By eliminating manual steps and allowing engineering and analysis processes to be built around an abstract model, this new process condenses project timelines – in a project piloting the new technology, extracting data from a CAD model and using it to populate an analysis database was slashed from an all-day job to just two hours. Even more, the new process makes it feasible to begin analysis early in design, while alternative geometries and product configurations are still being evaluated.

        Mike Patterson emphasizes how this rapid-response capability (based on Comet’s automation platform) promises to transform the role of simulation and analysis in product development, radically increasing the value it offers to a program. “We want to change analysis from a reactive process occurring late in development, to a proactive process used early and throughout design.”

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          • When fast isn’t fast enough

            If you would get access to the heart of development at a top Formula 1 team, chances are high that you would find they simulate their vehicle-handling behavior using Modelica models. Dymola and the Vehicle Dynamics Library (VDL) are the de-facto standards for simulating car handling in the premiere motorsports leagues.

            Solution Providers:

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            If you would get access to the heart of development at a top Formula 1 team, chances are high that you would find they simulate their vehicle-handling behavior using Modelica models — the same holds true for NASCAR. Dymola and the Vehicle Dynamics Library (VDL) are the de-facto standards for simulating car handling in the premiere motorsports leagues. In this post, I will explain why.

            View Story

            • Using an Intelligent Template to Analyze a Complex Optical System

              This NASA Langley case study demonstrates how and why a simulation template was used to aid in the analysis and design of a complex space-borne electro-optical sensor.

              View Summary

              Structural-Thermal-Optical-Performance (STOP) Model Development and Analysis of a Field-widened Michelson Interferometer

              An integrated Structural-Thermal-Optical-Performance (STOP) model was developed for a field-widened Michelson interferometer which is being built and tested for the High Spectral Resolution Lidar (HSRL) project at NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC). The performance of the interferometer is highly sensitive to thermal expansion, changes in refractive index with temperature, temperature gradients, and deformation due to mounting stresses. Hand calculations can only predict system performance for uniform temperature changes. An integrated STOP Simulation Template was developed to automate and investigate the effects of design modifications on the performance of the interferometer in detail, including CTE mismatch, and other three- dimensional effects.

              The STOP Template was developed using the Comet SimApp Authoring Workspace which performs automated integration between Pro-Engineer®, Thermal Desktop®, MSC Nastran™, SigFit™, Code V™, and MATLAB®. This is the first flight project for which LaRC has utilized Comet, and it allows a larger trade space to be studied in a shorter time than would be possible in a traditional STOP analysis. This paper describes the development of the STOP Template, presents a comparison of STOP results for simple cases with hand calculations, and presents results of the correlation effort to bench-top testing of the interferometer. A trade study conducted with the STOP model which demonstrates a few simple design changes that can improve the performance seen in the lab is also presented.

              This paper was published in the 2014 Conference Proceedings of the SPIE.

              View ArticleDownload

            • Highly Usable Apps at Intel

              Zack Eckblad shares his views on the importance of usability, highly-usable simulation apps, speaking the language of the user for non-experts at Intel.

              Solution Providers:

              Comet Solutions

              View Summary

              As part of a one-hour NAFEMS webinar on,  “Democratization: Usability,” Zack Eckblad shares his vision for applying numerical structural analysis to all products and associated best practices metrics at Intel. In this presentation, Zack delivers a demo highlighting analysis processes for a socket stack while comparing old processes lasting three months to a new process that only took three days. Additionally, he covers the value of webtools and the changing roles and responsibilities in the organization.

              Presented on: October 1, 2015

              Password: $g4SyY

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                • Expert Knowledge Capture & Reuse at American-Axle & NASA

                  Ravi Desi (American-Axle Manufacturing) and Tory Scola (NASA Langley) discuss the importance of knowledge capture & reuse and why companies need to embrace targeted, solution-focused simulation apps to gain measurable improvements in innovation, development time, and related product quality.

                  Solution Providers:

                  Comet Solutions

                  View Summary

                  As part of a one-hour NAFEMS webinar on,  “Democratization: Expert Knowledge Capture & Reuse,” Ravi Desi explains why knowledge capture and reuse is critical in developing new vehicle architectures and for faster decision making at American-Axle Manufacturing. Tory Scola shares how NASA Langley adopted a new process for automated design space exploration (with complex multiphysics calculations, including design changes) resulting in a single iteration taking a full week down to 140 analyses in a single overnight run.

                  Presented on: September 17, 2015

                  Password: a?p9K?

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