Citation

Thomas DJ. J. Fail. Anal. Prev. 2017; 17(1): 1-3.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, ASM International, Publisher Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s11668-016-0217-8

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

When designing safety critical structures, it is vital to ensure that integrity and reliability is maintained and that not be compromised throughout the entire life of the application. In yesteryear, designers would progress from a computer-aided design to a fabricated concept prototype, which would then undergo functional testing. At this stage, if the design is determined to be structurally or materially defective, then this required redesign and a subsequent second-stage prototype generated, which results in high costs incurred, time delays and iterations in design cycles.
The automotive industry would once crash-test hundreds of prototype vehicles on the path to developing a final product. This is where finite element analysis (FEA) comes in, allowing a lot more to be learned about materials and structural engineering before the fabrication of the first prototype. During the combined design and FEA process, a complex automotive structure can progress in several design directions, which results in the final product being highly optimised to its environment. For engineering designers FEA modelling is useful to highlight possible design and material issues in any region of the component whilst it is still in its design stage...

Language: en