FEA is a digital way to test designs against predictable forces, to determine whether a design will fail and, if so, when and how the material will deform, snap, or collapse. As a central part of engineering analysis, FEA also helps ensure against risky under-design and costly over-design. Finite element analysis has migrated over the years from a purely academic pursuit into everyday product development.
engineering analysis
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When I volunteered to judge the Finger lakes FIRST Robotics competition, I had no idea how much I was about to learn about business, and about how strongly teamwork correlates to success.
It's a battle as old as Finite Element Analysis. How do you achieve accurate results while balancing size and solve time of a FEA model? Simple models may solve quickly, but are the results accurate? And, complex models may provide very accurate results, but solve time could be hours or even days. In this blog we'll discuss Convergence & Mesh Independence and see how it relates to this age-old battle.
Finite Element Analysis (FEA) is a powerful tool for evaluating complex structural problems. Like all analytical software, bad results stem from bad input. We call it the "Garbage in, Garbage Out" principle of FEA. Sometimes, with perfect inputs, you can still get the wrong answer using FEA. There are a lot of ways that your finite element analysis can take a wrong turn. So how do you know if your results are correct? The answer is validation and verification (V&V). This week we'll apply V&V to a simple beam bending problem.
