Friday July 15, 2016 at 12:28pm
University Of Cambridge student Jonathan Pawson updates us on his placement progress with Solid Solutions. Week 3
Week 3 is complete and time for another update. This week
has been a lot more training; Simulation and Flow this time and it’s been
interesting to branch out again into a different area of the software and look
a bit more at the real world applications of SOLIDWORKS.
I’ve been able to use what I’ve learnt on the training
courses to do a simulation on the D-lock holder, to predict if and where it
would fail.
(A stress
analysis modelling static loading from the D-lock)
The results show that when stationary, the holder can easily
take the weight of the lock (the yield stress of PLA is about 60MPa) and also
which regions of the design should be strengthened if needed.
I was also able to do a flow analysis of the lock for when
travelling on a bike, which can be used to generate a stress analysis for the
lock in motion.
(The flow of air over
the lock and holder, when travelling at about 15mph)
I’ve also been testing out the lock holder throughout the
week on the cycle to and from the office.
After using it for about a week it split along one of the
layers. And
then after using it for another day it has properly broken!
It failed differently to the stress analysis because the
stress analysis assume the material was isotropic, but due to the method of
fabrication (3D printing) it isn’t.
In my final week, I’ll have to perfect the dimensions of the
design and increase the strength of the design by printing it differently.