Title: Some general aspects of FEM usage

Authors: Henrik Kanstrup Jorgensen

Addresses: Vestas Wind Systems A/S, Smed Hansensvej 27, 6940 Lem, Denmark

Abstract: This paper presents experiences from the implementation of CAD/CAM/CAE/FEM in different companies in Denmark and attempts to relate these experiences to better usage of these software tools in the future. These experiences do not relate to the mathematics of FEM, but to the reasons why FEM usage has not become as widespread as imagined twenty-five years ago: reasons like the |knowledge gap|, lack of necessary simplification and lack of proper strategies. The |knowledge gap| is defined here as the difference between the world of academia and CAE/FEM suppliers and the realities of the users; the difference between the everyday problems of the designer or engineer and what is presumed to be basic and already solved. This paper focuses on the reasons why FEM and other computer technological advances have not meant the predicted improvements, especially in product development efficiency, and it may scare potential users. This is not the purpose, since these tools are and will be important to achieve better product development in the future.

Keywords: computer-aided design; CAD; computer-aided engineering; CAE; computer-aided manufacturing; CAM; finite element method; FEM; future trends; implementation personnel; implementation strategy.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCAT.1994.062514

International Journal of Computer Applications in Technology, 1994 Vol.7 No.3/4/5/6, pp.124 - 130

Published online: 09 Jun 2014 *

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