Composites design...How well do you manage change?
Large composites airframers have documented that the use of VISTAGY's FiberSIM software has resulted in significant reductions in overall product development time—positively impacting entire programs and delivering more innovative products. FiberSIM's ability to support the entire composites engineering process by accommodating changes with speed, accuracy and agility sets it apart from the competition.
FiberSIM applies a revolutionary approach to designing composite parts that speeds the initial design process and enables work to be done concurrently on interfacing structures. Its unique structure-based design methodology enables engineers to use the requirements defined by stress engineers in the earliest stage of the design process, automatically generating layer and ply boundaries based on design rules and transition specifications. As a result, an initial design is arrived at in far less time and at lowered cost.
But the benefits of developing an initial design more quickly are greatly multiplied by being able to easily and efficiently make changes throughout the development process. Because program time constraints often require designers to start without all of the final requirements, multiple design and stress iterations are essential to achieve a final design that is both structurally optimal and the lowest possible weight.
Here's what FiberSIM customers have recently reported about their success with managing changes and reaching their program goals:
- FiberSIM is driven directly from analysis so that multiple iterations can be completed quickly - FiberSIM provides XML- and Excel-based tools to quickly import changes to thickness laws, eliminating time-consuming and error-prone manual entry of data. The layer shapes are then automatically re-computed by updating the zone to layer analysis. No manual geometry changes are necessary.
- FiberSIM automates composite design changes for many scenarios - Relocation of underlying structures or mating parts like ribs, frames and stringers; changes to thickness laws; system requirement changes like holes or cut-outs for tubing and wiring; or even lofting changes to the outer aerodynamic surfaces are all enabled many times faster with FiberSIM because boundaries are automatically computed based on zone boundaries, transition specifications and drop-off order, causing dynamic updates to the layer and ply boundaries.
- Changes are propagated automatically throughout the entire design - Because composite parts are usually part of a larger assembly, a change in one component often affects the details of others. With FiberSIM, updates to thickness laws and zone specifications automatically propagate throughout the entire design, including mating substructures. The data is fully associative, so you don't need to manually interrogate the model to understand what needs to be updated as a result of the change.
- A powerful and familiar user interface makes engineers more efficient - The FiberSIM user interface provides intuitive tools for grouping, sorting, filtering and multi-editing objects, which enables changes to be made with unprecedented speed and accuracy while reducing repetitive and time-consuming tasks. Because the software operates within the familiar CAD system, it is a natural part of the normal workflow.
So what does all this mean to you? It means that you are freed from the tedious and error-prone burden of creating and updating geometry whenever you want to make a design change—enabling you to test many different concepts and perform more iterations far more quickly.
The result? Lightweight, structurally sound aerostructures, all delivered within the demanding deadlines and budgets of your airframe program.
To find out more about the FiberSIM suite of software tools, click here. To learn about how customers across the globe have used FiberSIM successfully in production, please click here.