FEA which one to choose

We've been using Cosmos Designer in SWX environment for almost a year now
and I feel that we need more capable FEA program. Products for which we need
to run FEA are in the door hardware category and the 'answers' we're looking
for are like impact (slamming of the door) strength, using plastic
components (non linear materials), fatigue and standard analysis. I've
looked at CosmosWorks Professional Advanced (on Cosmos website) and although
it seems to have it all (if 'drop' equals impact) but also has a lot of
stuff which we don't need and quite steep price tag. I would appreciate your
suggestions of other FEA programs that fit the bill.
TIA
Eric

 

I work for a manufacturer of automotive interior hinges. We recently
benchmarked ANSYS, MARC, and NEiNASTRAN to replace our current
MSC.NASTRAN (which couldn't handle our contact and large rotation
well). All performed well and are worth a look.

COSMOS didn't make the first cut.

 

We didn't look at ALGOR. The consultant we work with didn't include it
in his list of candidates, so it didn't come up.

Initially, we were looking at replacing MSC.NASTRAN with MSC.MARC, as
recommended by our MSC rep (!). We wanted to benchmark at least two
others, and NEiNASTRAN and ANSYS were the ones we chose with the help
of a consultant we have on retainer for training and mentoring (and
knows our work very well).

 

CosmosWorks and DesignStar are still works in progress for which you
will find limitations in how far you can go. The older and more
difficult to use Cosmos/M can do it all, but has an older interface.

I have both DesignStar and NE/Nastran available to me.
ANSYS is also a mature product.

 

There are a couple things about CosmosWorks that you need to strongly
consider.

1. When you run a long and large analysis:

a. It ties up SW for the duration
b. All the memory that SW uses is not available for the FEA program to use.

2. If documentation of your analysis is important to you then you shouldn't
change geometry in SW after making the run. This is both a strength and a
weakness. It is a strength in that you can quickly search for the most
efficient structure. It is a weakness when you have to document what you
did in order to defend yourself when product X fails. Since SW files are
always changing in size how can you prove the file you are looking at is
the one you did the original analysis in?

A program like DesignStar can also link to actively changing geometry, but
provides a standalone archivable file for documentation. And the solver can
be run without the GUI for maximum memory usage. It can also run nicely
along with SW by setting its priority down in task manager. I have run 60
hour analyses with DStar while using SW.

 

I just ran across this link.

http://www.ctceng.com/

and this one

www.NENastran.com

 

I recommend NEiWorks which is a Nastran pre and post processor and
solver inside of SolidWorks. NEiNastran supports surface to surface
contact. See their website for demos
http://www.nenastran.com/newnoran/animation.php

VERY IMPRESSIVE!