In this issue ofThe Blend, Spatial’s quarterly newsletter, we will look at how design and manufacturing are moving closer together, thanks to new and innovative usage of 3D modeling, plus our usual features of recent news and customer spotlight.
There is a new wave of innovative processes and solutions that improve product production throughput and enable once-impossible product creation. Advances such as model-based design (MBD), additive manufacturing (3D printing), pervasive engineering simulation and robotics are making it possible to streamline the product development process, reduce cost of production and accelerate time to market.
MBD has had a profound impact on manufacturing, moving design from the 2D to 3D realm, greatly increasing the speed of getting from concept to finished goods. With the available 3D modeling tools, engineers can design not only parts, but whole systems in software, including the ability to virtually simulate, test, and inspect a system mechanically. While software has been able to tie manufacturing closer to design, as well as speed up the physical design process, one area that has been more difficult to optimize is analysis.
Today’s practical reality is that 3D analysis is expensive in terms of schedule and required specialized personnel. Existing engineering simulation tools are powerful yet complex. A complex simulation can take from days to months to complete, forcing a lengthened design cycle. Moreover, running a simulation requires a special expertise that may not be accessible to all design teams. As a result, engineers are forced into using rules of thumb, reusing proven design aspects in an attempt to reduce the amount of analysis before prototyping. The net result is a reduced number of possible solutions that can be investigated during the initial design phase, increasing market risk and reducing the chances for design optimization.
Tune in on October 19that 2pm Eastern Time to hear Ray Bagley, Product Management Director at Spatial, present the webinar,Solving the Multi-Application Challenge to get from CAD Model to 3D Print.This webinar, hosted byENGINEERING.com, will explore the rapidly evolving needs of additive manufacturing software applications, covering:
What defines the ideal software platform for OEMs and independent software vendors (ISVs) that will allow end users to perform all the needed tasks in a single application.
How to avoid degradation of a design when moving from CAD to STL.
How to optimize the design for 3D printing through smart setup choices.
How to take advantage of hybrid additive/subtractive technology.
ModuleWorks is the leading supplier of CAD/CAM software development toolkits for machining and simulation. The long history of cooperation between the company and Spatial has ensured fast and flexible integration of libraries from both companies into CAD/CAM applications, accelerating the development of advanced, cost-effective workflow solutions for our mutual customers.
Recently ModuleWorks launched new high-performance additive components that when combined with the power of Spatial’s CGM Polyhedra SDK, empower ISVs with the tools they need to provide new, powerful, 3D printing solutions for end users.
This combined solution relies on CGM Polyhedra SDK, with its sophisticated surface recognition and powerful checking and healing capabilities, to deliver a precise, watertight mesh. This mesh, along with high-precision CAD data, can then be passed to the high-performance ModuleWorks components to create complete, cost-effective workflows for high-quality additive and hybrid machining applications. The ModuleWorks additive software components offer toolpath calculation and simulation, as well as advanced nozzle and material definition, multiple STL capabilities, and automatic nesting.
Coventor and Spatial have long collaborated to bring best-in-class 3D modeling technology to design automation and virtual fabrication solutions targeting microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) and semiconductor devices. Recently, Coventor announced the release of CoventorMP. This new platform combines the complementary strengths of Coventor’s industry-leading software tools for MEMS design, CoventorWare and MEMS+, into a single powerful environment for MEMS design automation. This solution provides a seamless path for integrating MEMS sensors and actuators into system-in-package (SiP) components targeted at Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
Key to this new platform is advanced modeling supplied by Spatial’s 3D ACIS Modeler. By using a common modeling kernel, both Coventor solutions can reference the same model, regardless of whether for exploring the physical design space or multi-domain physics simulation.
In case you missed it, here are a few highlights from our recent blog posts.
Spending Development Resources Wisely
In the 3D modeling space, application developers face a number of challenges — getting to market on time, delivering the right feature set, producing a high-quality product — all while staying within budget. For companies to remain competitive, it is critical to invest resources and time on developing differentiated product features, rather than on behind-the-scenes, enabling technology.
Thisblogpost covers the make-versus-buy decision companies face when it comes to critical software technology.
Rounding Dimension Values from 3D InterOp
One of the first things that a new developer in geometric modeling gets to learn is that calculations using floating point values can introduce tiny inaccuracies due to the precision of the floating point representation.Due to the way floating point numbers are represented in computers, 0.2375 does not have that exact value when assigned to a double in C++.
This blog post discusses the issue of variances between displayed values being rounded versus the actual number being held in memory.
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