Introducing Multiphysics Workflows to Accelerate the Design of Electric Motor Driven Systems

Dactem (a DAM group company), developer of specialist test, measurement and assembly solutions for the aerospace industries, presents an overview of the optimization of a thrust balance used for accurate measurements in electrical thruster qualification endurance testing. The presentation will provide details on how a Multiphysics simulation approach was used to find the optimum design taking mechanical, thermal and electromagnetic performance into account. Speakers: Emmanuel Pouleau, CEO, Dactem (a DAM Group company) Pierre Moutet, Engineer, Dactem (a DAM Group company) Duration: 15 minutes

This workshop demonstrates how a simulation-driven design approach to product development can have a drastic impact on the performance, design time, and profitability of a new product. Using a belt sander tool as a demonstration model, our presenters show how Altair’s design and simulation technologies can conduct a concept design analysis and optimization of the sander external housing to improve stiffness and reduce weight. They go on to show how we can simulate the manufacturing process itself by looking at filling, packing, cooling and warpage of the plastic housing; before concluding with a series of stress analysis and validation studies such as a virtual drop test, 3-point bending simulation and even a study of the effect of the heat transfer of the electric motor. This is a valuable session to see how simulation technologies can be used throughout the design process, adding value and reducing development time at each stage. Speakers: Ujwal Patnaik, Global Business Development Manager, Altair Chris Sambell, Application Engineer, Altair Duration: 60 minutes

This presentation is an overview of Rizel Automotive’s R&D journey towards developing an efficient and cost-effective Motor Platform with optimum characteristics for the automotive EV Space using Altair’s tools to solve electromagnetic, structural, NVH, and Thermal challenges and validate the Digital Designs and through Physical Testing. All the way through the design process, Altair tools helped us in solving the complex problems which solve the core electric motor problems; like inductances calculation, cogging torque optimization, D axis conditioning, model analysis, transient thermal analysis which helped us in understanding and validating our analytical design and research. With the help of Altair tools, we were able to implement and validate our novel ideas related to thermal design and come up with a unique motor architecture without compromising on electromagnetics. In this process, we have designed one of the lightest and compact radial flux motors in the industry. Easy to use software from Altair, with a simple interface and automation tools; helped us to iterate, fine-tune our motors with high accuracy and a much quicker pace. And helped us to engineer a powerful yet silent and cooler but efficient motor. From our recent dyno testing at ARAI, we were able to match the simulated data to dyno test results with a deviance of less than 5%, giving us great confidence in our Simulation Techniques and Altair’s tools, helping us decrease the Time to Enter the Market.

The usability of a headset is largely determined by a comfortable fit and its resistance to everyday use. Learn from Alice Lin, Manager of Mechanics at GN Audio R&D how she introduced FEM simulation capabilities at Jabra. The presentation shows how product design benefits from structural analysis, design for comfort, and drop test simulation. A future extension of simulation capabilities intends to address more areas and improve the simulation-driven design process efficiency. Speaker: Alice Lin, Manager of Mechanics, GN Audio Duration: 22 minutes Click the AD icon to select alternative audio translations - French, German, Portuguese and Spanish.

AAM has been providing mechanical drivelines to automotive customers for more than 25 years. As the automobile transitions to electrification, so too must the driveline. AAM has developed a suite of innovative, lightweight, compact and cost-optimized electric drive units and electric beam axles to meet the growing global technology demand as electric vehicles continue to expand over the next decade. Engineering simulation, optimization and validation tools were significant enablers to increase the validation confidence and reduce the time to market for these new products.

An intuitive and robust CFD workflow is available in Altair® SimLab® - a process-oriented, feature-based finite element analysis software that allows you to quickly and accurately simulate the engineering behavior of complex assemblies. For fluid and thermal analyses, SimLab can make the model setup process even faster, repeatable, thereby minimizing tedious manual steps that can be automated. A live demo will be performed using real-world models to show the simple and smooth analysis process in Altair SimLab that goes from CAD to results in minutes.

For the past three decades, Altair’s optimization solutions have driven the innovative, lightweight, and structurally efficient designs of many products you see and use every day. The intense focus on additive manufacturing in recent years have given a boost to topology optimization and generative design, providing more freedom to explore alternatives. Today, we keep on innovating the technology, looking at including multiple physics, like thermal, electromagnetics, and fluid flow to drive design. Altair AcuSolve – coupled with Altair Optistruct – enables engineers to find the optimum shape by simply defining inlets, outlets, and the allowable space in which the solver can work. AcuSolve’s gradient-based topology optimization method will quickly and efficiently find the path of least resistance to deliver fluid flows with minimal effort.

To design today’s tightly packaged electronic systems it is essential to create a thermal analysis model of the PCB within its enclosure. Learn how Altair SimLab provides robust and repeatable workflows for fast, accurate, and consistent analysis, even for occasional users allowing them to confidently identify and correct potential design issues earlier in development with accurate thermal analysis that doesn’t require advanced CFD knowledge.

The increasing complexity of machines requires active management and evaluation of potential product failures and simulation of physically accurate conditions during development. Achieved through multiphysics simulation, Altair SimLab can simulate a wide range of interacting physical models including fluid-structure interaction (FSI) and thermomechanical simulation. By helping with complex design problems, simplified modeling workflows give a deeper understanding of phenomena and root causes of unwanted behavior.

Brett Chouinard, President and COO of Altair discusses Development challenges in Industrial machinery and illustrates how Altair's scalable simulation solutions provide the environment for simulation-driven innovation and how machine learning expands the capabilities furter.

Felix Koerfer, Technical Consultant at Altair, gives a Demo Sessions on Altair Simulation Solutions for faster evaluation of real-world machines, explaining how accurate structural assessment with real loading conditions allows assessment of global stress and deformations, evaluation of bolt forces, and how accuracy & deformation of linear bearings cna be achieved.

A recording of the electric motor development panel discussion as part of the ATCx Electric Powertrain virtual event in March 2021. The panel features insight from Cleef Thackwell, Lead Motor Design Engineer at Jaguar Land Rover; Dr. Lars Fredriksson, VP Global Automotive at Altair; James Eves, Team Manager at Altair; Jonathan Stevens, Senior Development Engineer at Equipmake; Andy Jones, Innovation Program Manager at HiETA Technologies; Sergi Riba, Design Engineer at Safran Ventilation Systems; and Vincent Leconte, Senior Director of Global Business Development, Electromechanical Solutions at Altair.

Andrew Lawton, Principal Research Engineer at Smart Manufacturing Technology. Andrew has worked at SMT for almost 10 years with a focus on the dynamic analysis of drivetrains, including the effect of excitation forces from the electric machine as well as the gears. Andrew’s presentation will cover NVH analysis of an EV drivetrain, specifically with regard to response to electric machine forces generated by Altair Flux.  He will illustrate this by looking at how the presence of unbalanced magnetic pull can affect the NVH response by importing the forces from Flux into MASTA.

James Eves, Team Manager at Altair, Jonathan Stevens, Senior Development Engineer at Equipmake and Andy Jones, Innovation Program Manager at HiETA Technologies, discuss AMPERE, a joint project to produce an extremely lightweight, efficient but low-cost electric motor with an extremely high continuous power density. The consortium will present some of the engineering challenges that designing such a high performance motor has posed, and how these challenges have been overcome through advanced manufacturing technology and simulation driven design.

Sergi Riba, Design Engineer at Safran Ventilation Systems, with a brief introduction by Vincent Leconte, Senior Director of Global Business Development - EM Solution at Altair. Together they discuss the development of electric machines for the aerospace sector.

Dr. Royston Jones, CTO and Dr. Anthony Hahnel, Technical Director, give their keynote presentation during the ATCx Driving Innovation in Electric Powertrain 2021.

Altair CTO James Dagg presents an overview of the journey Altair took to develop the leading modeling and visualization technologies we have today, and provides a look at what’s coming next to help you reduce your product delivery time. James Dagg has been at Altair for more than 30 years and is a visionary behind Altair’s software strategy and development activities. He has also led the development of Altair’s concept design technologies and oversaw the development of Altair’s CAE software suite for more than a decade.

Stephen White, Technical Support Manager, introduces Altair SimLab, a process-oriented, feature-based finite element modeling software that allows you to quickly and accurately simulate behaviour of complex assemblies. SimLab covers multiple physics including structural, thermal and fluid dynamics which can be easily setup and automated, helping to drastically reduce the time you spend creating finite element models and interpreting results.

BMW Motorrad is the motorcycle division of BMW, a German multinational company manufacturing luxury automobiles and motorcycles. With the first motorcycle manufactured in 1923, their current product line includes a variety of shaft, chain, and belt-driven models designed for off-road, dual-purpose, and sports powered by a variety of engines ranging from a single cylinder, various two cylinder (parallel twin, flat twin, boxer etc.), four cylinders inline and six-cylinder inline ones. BMW Motorrad faced a challenge with their model build processes, needing to move previously outsourced crankshaft modeling work in-house while also reducing lead time. Through a semi-automated modeling process based on Altair SimLab, BMW Motorrad developed scripts which reduced FE model generation time down 80%, from 2 weeks of manual work to just half a day. Ruediger Ott, HyperWorks Business Development at Altair, presents a use case from BMW Motorcycles who found that they could significantly reduce the model build time of their powertrain assemblies with SimLab, making use of the automation capabilities to minimize manually effort and refinement.

More and more engineers need to solve problems that can span multiple physics including structural, thermal, electromagnetics, and fluid dynamics.

Altair’s portfolio of simulation-driven design solutions covers – amongst many other disciplines – electromagnetics (EM) and electronic design automation (EDA).

Simulation-driven design powered by topology optimization was created by OptiStruct over two decades ago. Its success has changed the CAE/CAD industry as today all vendors have embraced this trend.

Vincent Leconte, Director of Business Development - EM Solutions at Altair presents at the 2019 UK e-Mobility Seminar. Optimization of e-Motors, Case Studies: Jaguar Land Rover & Porsche. Cooling Simulation of the eMotors.

Electrification is one of the main means of creating a low-carbon economy, allowing to use renewable energies and energy efficient technologies. Electric power enters many industries and also impacts our everyday lives, especially with the electric mobility. The use of power electronics and control systems allows offering better reliability, safety and low maintenance costs, and also brings additional innovative functions. Learn how Altair simulation and optimization tools can help designing highly efficient electric machines, as well as advanced control strategies to help you build innovative and energy efficient electric solutions.

This presentation introduces an application of a unique, highly automatic, multi-physics design strategy for E-motors, based on a current program at Mercedes-AMG GmbH. The strategy considers essential development requirements including electromagnetics and thermal requirements, NVH, stress and durability. It accommodates for DOE, multi-objective optimization and design exploration methods to be used to explore and find feasible motor designs. The presentation will show how the strategy adds efficiency to the E-motor development process and how it impacts the total costs of development.

The Altair Multiphysics platform provides a broad portfolio of solvers and tools to help engineers develop e-motor design requirements by using simulation and optimization methods. This presentation provides examples, using Altair Machine Learning and optimization solutions, of the e-motor requirements by leveraging in data available, which is key for e-motor designers to reduce time-to-market.

This presentation demonstrates Altair’s capability of simulating the behavior of a mechanically damaged battery from a cell to a pack integrated in a vehicle, based on collaborative research previously conducted with MIT. An innovative approach of applying electromagnetics loss to predict rising temperature due to short circuit effects during an impact is discussed, along with the development of a software tool, Battery Design, which enables OEMs and suppliers to design battery applications using multiphysics optimization, including mechanical-electrical-electrochemical-thermal behaviors.

Presentation by Koby Ingram, Gevasol BV. Conceptual Design and optimization of an Electric Motor using Altair Flux and HyperStudy. The customized electric machine with high level demands and efficiency is a challenging topic requiring top level of expertise and best in class simulation tools. This work focuses on the usage of Flux and Hyperstudy as tools for bettering the design and design process of e-motors. Presentation at the ATCx in Israel, Netanya on October 30, 2019.

Presenters: Ulrich Marl, Key Account Manager for Electric Vehicle Motor-Feedback Systems, Lenord+Bauer & Andy Dyer, MBD Sr Technical Specialist, Altair

This presentation shows a modeling process to quantify the position/speed sensor (e.g, encoder) effects on an e-motor, and corresponding control system for a concept traction motor similar to the Nissan Leaf. The integrated solution of the e-drive is carried in Altair Activate as a system builder, using other Altair solutions e-motor solutions in FluxMotor and Flux to generate data for the e-motor itself, as well as the optimal current values for the Field-Oriented Contoller. The inverter is driven with efficient space vector pulse width modulation. The integrated solution also supports different levels of modeling fidelity for the system components, for example for the e-motor where either direct co-simulation with Flux for detailed finite element analysis or a reduced order model (ROM) using look-up tables. In this way, sensor design parameters can be evaluated within an accurate system of the e-drive to improve performance and efficiency.

Altair SimLab: The New Platform for Multiphysics Gunaseelan Krishnasamy, Vice President, SimLab Development, Altair

This presentation was given on April 11, 2019 at ATCx Electromechanical Applications in Troy, MI.

Presentation by Kamalraj Rajagopal, Senior Application Engineer at Altair.

Using a realistic example involving Python as the scripting and process automation tool used by Altair SimLab™, learn how to use Compose to create and debug Python scripts.

Presentation by Juan Pedro Berro Ramirez, Radioss Expert at Altair.

Using a realistic example involving nonlinear FEA codes such as Radioss, learn how to use Compose to help characterize and calibrate material models to improve the match between simulation results and experimental results.

Presentation by Livio Mariano, Technical Specialist, Math & Systems at Altair.

Using a realistic example of calculating home heating efficiency, learn how to leverage the interoperability between Compose and Excel to get the best of both worlds: Excel for the front-end (i.e., GUI generation) and back-end (i.e., results analysis) with Compose for the middle (i.e., modeling and simulating complex systems).

Presentation by Michele Macchioni, Director, ModVis Program and Development Management at Altair.

Using a realistic example of performing standard handbook-type calculations for aircraft structural components (in this case, calculating reserve factors for aircraft fasteners), learn how functions can be easily created in Compose, registered there, and then re-used with other Altair tools such as the Matrix Browser in HyperWorks – optionally visualizing calculation results directly on your FEM.

Learn how to use Compose for 0D modeling & simulation, as complementary to 1D and 3D CAE simulations – to perform useful numerical computations; to do parametric modeling; to create scripts; to automate commonly repeated product development processes; to complement or replace legacy in-house codes; to visualize and manipulate CAE data; and more.

Compose uses OpenMatrix Language (OML) syntax that is directly compatible with MATLAB/Octave and interoperable with Python – so you can preserve and reuse existing scripts constructed with these other languages.

Presentations recorded at the Global ATC in Paris, France on October 16, 2018.

Presentation by Franck Delcroix, VP, Program Management Math at Altair.

This interactive session will highlight the following capabilities of Altair Compose: using its OpenMatrix Language (OML) for calculations, scripts, debugging, data visualization and post-processing; Working with Python; Using multiple languages together; Creating your own GUIs; Optimization; Integrating with Altair HyperWorks.

Presentation by Michael Dambach, Vice President, HyperWorks Program Management at Altair.

Presentation by Joe Kovacs, Director - Model Assembly at Altair.

Presentation by Jose Maria Cueva De Leon, Senior Program Manager at Altair.