MPIC 2023

[Guest tom@ntecholding.com]

What are the newest features, updates etc i MPIC 2023 ?

I have MultiPhysics and are very interested in what is New here.

[Cary OConnor]

Multiphysics for IronCAD 2023: New Technologies, Enhancements and Updates (Rev 12/12/2023)

Since the unveiling of Multiphysics for IronCAD(MPIC), its usability and robustness have been appreciated by many users. Each year, additional improvements and refinement have been added to further increase the ease of use and the functionality.  Most of these new features are based on user feedback and request to speed up design cycle, simplify analysis setup, and reduce analysis times.

In MPIC 2023, we have included several key technologies designed specifically for CAD design analysis.  We focus on general CAD designers and users who want to adopt design analysis earlier in the digital prototyping cycle, and aim to provide accurate, realistic and quick analysis.  As such, most improvements are toward the assembly analysis functionalities.

MPIC 2023 New Technologies and Features

·         Over the past few years, we have developed a new tolerance assembly meshing technology for uniting assembly parts as integrated connected bodies.  This new technology uses parts’ discrete boundary surface facets to smartly unite parts together for design analysis, rather than rely on CAD kernel’s Boolean operation that requires precision matching, or for models with intentional gap between parts for welding, thermal expansion or shrinkage control.

In the 2023 update, we further enhanced the assembly analysis capabilities. In many situations, the CAD parts may still have gaps that are too large to be automatically recognized without precisely setting up a larger healing tolerance. In such cases, we have further enhanced the finite element tying capabilities. New intelligence has been added to this discrete mesh tying ability, searching of gap/overlap,  and the ability to automatically recognize candidates for the mesh gluing using moving-least-squares technology has been enhanced and refined.

Combining these two technologies, users can quickly analyze an assembly with all physics including stress, thermal, electrical and fluid dynamic quickly with ease without going through laborious geometry checking and fixing. 

·         An important accuracy feature in the convective heat transfer in computational fluid dynamic (CFD) analysis has also been released in 2023. Such conjugated CFD analysis are critical for analyzing convective heat transfer in fluid flow in cases as small as heat-pipe used in IC/CPU chip cooling to cases as large as water cooling/heating tank or tower design. Traditionally, flow upwind numerical schemes are used to increase the accuracy of such convective heat transfer accuracy.  In 2023 MPIC, we have further refined the least-squares technology to both the thermal diffusion and fluid Navier-Stokes equations without such numerical fudging and parameter tuning except strict convective energy balance enforcement.  Using such a method, sensitive behavior such as natural air cooling/heating or chemical vapor deposition analysis are calculated much more accurately than the traditional upwinding method without any numerical treatment.

 

·         In 2023, the MPIC finite element model loading and display speed have been dramatically improved using a special cached database scheme. For all MPIC generated models, loading and display now follow a quick “visibility display” scheme for much faster first display for user access followed by an on-demand invisible internal mesh loading. For larger models, the increase in speed could be several times or even 10X faster for models with several million elements.

 

·         Several visual features critical for analysis review have also been added:

 

o In result viewing, pressing the left-mouse-button while moving will now rotate the finite element display about the center of the model. This is useful when a model has a longer dimension in a specific direction and the rotation of model for result viewing requires focus on the screen center.

o A better interactive dynamic meshing inquire/display have been added so that the individual element inquiry or geometry faces are more clear. When the mouse cursor move over the desired inquiry, a quick highlight is shown to clearly indicate the location.

o The ribbon bar icons have been enhanced to show the active or on/off status.

MPIC 2023 Updates and Fixes

Below are the major issue fixes and updates:

·      When switching from different simulation tab, the boundary condition (loads or constraint) symbols are properly shown without user refreshing.

·      Fix acceleration "Set Direction" not showing the proper dialog issue.

·      Fix AddFea toolbar button not being enabled when all simulation tabs are deleted.

·      Fix contour legend not showing up the first time for some models.

·      Update the boundary condition selection options for both Constraint and Loads so all geometry types (body, vertex, face and edge) can be selected.

·      Update the analysis tab model changing re-display control such that it will allow user to control the automatic reload of result model

·      The discrete Boolean union retry tolerance setting has been updated to range from 0.1x to 1000x of the default value.

·      Multiple Nonlinear Multipliers are now available for nonlinear material properties or boundary condition scaling with different dependency such as on time/step, strain and temperature, etc.

·      Fix displacement magnitude and equivalent stress  in Analysis Report  such that they match the Images.

·      Fix Material page "update bodies" button not enabled.

·      Fix Analysis tree display not showing UseLsThermal flag when it is turned on.

·      Fix tie constraint Advanced setting button not enabled.

·      Correct acceleration dialog always sets acceleration default parameter to metric unit rather than user’ unit.

·      When both thermal and fluid are selected, editing xyz heat flux values in temperature dialog are enabled

·      Fix bug of About Analysis Dialog not using the last modified date.

·      Fix bug of material parts selection with duplicate setting.

·      Implement file version check between icampsres.dll and icamps.dll to issue warning if not identical for localized version.

·      Fix Rigid Rotation Unit change cannot be saved issue.

·      Fix bug in Rigid Rotation radian/degree issue (always use radian bug)

·      Multiple glue groups are controlled by the global glue/separate setting, rather than default to glue.

·      Enhance glue meshing by removing regions created from small overlap of parts.

[TomJ]

Thanks for this extensive feedback on MPIC 2023 version -  I have the standard/basic version And my use is very close to  what you describe as: n MPIC 2023, "key technologies designed specifically for CAD design analysis.  We focus on general CAD designers and users who want to adopt design analysis earlier in the digital prototyping cycle, and aim to provide accurate, realistic and quick analysis.  As such, most improvements are toward the assembly analysis functionalities."

Now, What I would really like to see more of, are videos of practical design cases explaining the best methods to do such analysises. I have many years of experience with SolidWorks Simulation , who have training sessions, books, etc.  MPIC is far more simpler to use, but without any good documentation or samples from "real life" situations i.e. Structures, vessels, lifting ears,lifting gears , bolts etc would be very interesting. also samples . And also "how to" edit material libraries. and customize reports.

It is a good program, but by having a better understanding of the capabilities it would be even better.