Solid Edge Simulation, ST4 Edition

As you may know, Ronnie Connerly took over Solid Edge Simulation back in March. I left him with a nice pile of issues, problems and incomplete software. Thanks to his previous experience with both Solid Edge and FEA, the Simulation team didn’t miss a step.

The two big things added for SE Simulation is support for Frames using beam elements and assembly level sheet metal analysis. Lets start with that.

New in ST4 is the ability to create simulation geometry in the assembly document. One of the best ways this can be useful is if you are doing assemblies with sheet metal. A 2D Mesh is usually the fastest and most accurate way to do this but that means you also need mid surfaces on which to base it. You don’t want to go back to each part to do this and you may want to extend or trim the surfaces to each other for a better analysis.

• Copy surface or solid geometry from occurrences


• Create midsurfacesfrom sheet metal parts


• Modification commands to prepare geometry for analysis


• Can use simplified or designed parts


• Great when parts are read-only

The Second Big item is support for Frame analysis using beam elements. When geometry has a constant cross section, you can often use these 1D elments for fast and accurate analysis.



So what else was done?

• A new “united body” that lets you combine multiple surfaces for 2D meshes or 2D and 3D meshes.We’ve added support for NX Nastrans Edge Glue connector. You now have three ways to connect edges such as a T-junction in Sheet metal


• Many new meshing options to really fine tune the mesh.


• Usability enhancements like double click to edit objects in the pathfinder, connector symbols that only show up where the connection is, better numerical formating for post processing, and more.

If video is more your thing, heres a couple short videos to help you out too: