MSC.

visualNastran Desktop FEA

Exercise Workbook
Pin and Bracket Assembly: Vibration
Simulation in 4D
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Objectives
This exercise is design to introduce
vibration analysis in visualNastran Desktop.
You will determine the natural frequencies
of the part
Learn how to display the mode shape
contours for the foot support.
Exercise Overview
Introduction to visualNastran Desktop 4D
vibration analysis.
Import/Open a model from various CAD
applications.
Simulation and Display Settings.
Create a material.
Apply restraints.
Mesh the model.
Solve model.
Evaluate result.
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Step 1: Open Assembly / Connect Part
1) Open the associated Bracket_Pin.* file in
C:\Training\vnd101_files\Workshop 24 using the CAD
package you are working with. If no CAD package is
available, import Bracket_pin.SAT or Bracket_Pin.x_t.
If ACIS or Parasolid file is imported, skip sub-step 2,
3 and 4. Go directly to Creating Rigid Joint.
2) Connect the assembly or drawing over from Native
CAD to MSC.visualNastran 4D
Connecting the part over from Solidworks, MDT,
Pro-e, Inventor, and SolidEdge utilize Automatic
Constraint mapping which transfer mates into
physical joints.
3) Once the assembly is brought in from CAD, you will
notice that the bracket and the Pin is connected with a
revolute joint.
4) Skip to Step 3: Constraint Navigator
Figure 1 Open file
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No
Feature
Detected
Arc
Detected
Vertex
Detected
Step 2: Creating a Rigid Joint
1) When bodies are imported, you have to manually create the
constraint to simulate desired motion. For this assembly, we a
rigid joint is need to hold the two parts together.
2) Hide the Pin and rotate the Bracket so the hole on the back face
is visible shown in Figure 2.
3) Pick the Coord Icon from the toolbar and hover the mouse over
the body. You will notice that vN 4D allows arc detection for easy
placement in the center of the hole.
Move the mouse to the hi-lighted circular edge until you find a
cross-hair that allows you to place the coord in the center of
the hole as shown in Figure 3.
4) Left mouse click when the Arc is detected.
Figure 2 Back face surface detection
Figure 4 Coord Placement
Figure 3 Cross-hair
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Step 2: Creating a Rigid Joint
5) Turn the visibility of the pin back on and hide the bracket by right
clicking on the Object List or the Body.
6) Repeat Step 3 and 4 and add another coord on one of the face of
the Pin as shown in Figure 6.
Pick the circular edge second to the back face.
7) Go to the Object List and expand on the two bodies so you can
select the two Coords that we created.
Hold down the Shift key to multi-select. See Figure 7.
Figure 5 Hiding and showing bodies
Figure 6 Coord Placement
Figure 7 Selecting both Coords
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Step 2: Creating a Rigid Joint
8) With the two Coords selected, Pick the
Constraint Icon.
9) Pick Rigid Joint when the Create
Constraint Window appears.
10) Accept the Default Joint Type and
Click Create
11) The rigid joint will appear as in Figure
9.
Figure 8 Selecting both Coords
Figure 9 Rigid Joint
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Step 3: Constraint Navigator
1) Right Click on the Pin and open the Constraint Navigator
Constraint Navigator allows you to examine relationships among bodies,
subassemblies, and constraints so that you can verify and modify your
simulation model.
2) Navigate through constraint within the assembly by selecting Next on the
toolbar and use the Move tool to see its motion shown in Figure 11.
3) Change the Revolute Joint to a Rigid Joint if it is not already so by Double
Clicking on the constraint either in the Connection Window or the Object List
Window.
When changing a revolute joint to a rigid joint, you can either make the rigid
joint measurable or optimized. In this case we will want to Optimized the rigid
joint for faster simulation.
4) Click Close.
Figure 10 Constraint Navigator
Figure 11 Navigating through constraints
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Step 4: Display and Simulation Setting
1) From the World menu select Display Setting
or click the Display Setting button.
2) Click the Units tab.
3) Choose unit set English (pounds). Refer to
Figure 12.
4) Click Close.
Figure 12 Display Settings - Units
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Step 4: Display and Simulation Setting
1) From the World menu select Simulation
Settings or click on the Simulation Settings
button.
2) Click on the FEA tab and select Vibration for
Analysis type.
3) Specify 5 for Lowest modes in Desired
modes.
4) Make sure the Desired outputs Displacement
and Stress are selected.
5) Accept all other defaults as shown in Figure
13. Click Close.
Figure 13 Simulation Settings - FEA
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Step 5: Specify Material
1) Double-click on the bracket in the simulation window.
2) Select the Material tab.
3) Click Edit.
4) The Material Selector window appears. Select Aluminum 2024-T3 as shown in Figure 15.
5) Click OK.
6) Click the Appearance tab. Notice that the name bracket_assy_piece-1 is already given.
7) Leave everything else default. Click Apply and close.
8) Repeat steps 1 thru 7 for the pin and notice that a name pin_assy_piece-1 is also given. Choose
Steel-ANSI 304 for the pin material.
Figure15 Material Selector
Figure 14 Material
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Step 6: Apply Restraints
Figure 16 Restraint placement
1) Rotate the assembly to get a better view
of the holes.
The faces of the holes will be selected for
the restraint.
2) To apply restraints select Insert from the
menu and choose Restraint or click the
Restraint button.
3) Select the face of one of the holes as
shown in Figure 16.
4) Repeat step 2 and 3 for the next hole.
Restraint symbols appear on the geometry.
The model with restraints applied is
displayed in Figure 17.
Figure 17 Restraints
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Step 7: Meshing the Geometry
1) Double-click on the bracket in the simulation window. The
Properties of body window appears.
2) Select the FEA tab and check Include in FEA.
3) Check Show mesh and enter 0.5 for the Default Mesh Size.
Accept all other defaults. Refer to Figure 18.
4) Click the Mesh button to mesh the model.
5) Close the Properties window.
Figure 18 Properties of body - Mesh
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Step 7: Meshing the Geometry
6) Now double-click the pin.
7) Select the FEA tab in the Properties of
body window that appears.
8) Check Include in FEA.
9) Check Show mesh and enter 0.2 for the
Default Mesh Size. Accept all other
defaults.
10) Click the Mesh button to mesh the model.
11) Close the Properties window.
Solid elements are set by default. The
simulation window now shows the bracket
and pin with mesh elements. Shown in
Figure 19.
Figure 19 Meshed assembly
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Step 8: FEA Analysis
1) Click the Solve FEA button in the playback
controls.
2) The MSC.Nastran analysis window appears
to display analysis is in progress.
The analysis may take a few minutes.
3) After results are completed. visualNastran
Desktop will display the result in the
simulation window.
4) If not already shown, results such as Mesh,
Contours, Deformation and Forces can be
displayed by right-clicking on the model in
the simulation window. Refer to Figure 21.
5) Another way would be to click in the
Properties List on FEA display and the
Properties of body window appears.
6) Select the FEA Display tab and check on
the respective result to display, as shown in
Figure 22.
Figure 21 Show
Contours
Figure 20 MSC.Nastran analysis in progress
Figure 22 Display results
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Step 8: FEA Results
1) Click the Display setting icon and select FEA
Results.
2) 5 modes of vibration are shown. The current
mode shown in the simulation window is 1.
Each mode can be selected and animated in
the simulation window. Refer to Figure 23.
Figure 23 FEA Results Show different modes of vibrations
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Step 7: Results Animation
Figure 24 Animate result
3) Select mode number 5 and click close.
Notice that the Frequency of vibration is
shown in the simulation window for both the
pin and the bracket. In this case the resulting
frequency for the pin is 0.00137 Hz and
5.84e+3 Hz for the bracket.
4) The simulation window display the result
as shown in Figure 24.
5) To animate the result click the Run button
in the Playback Controls.
6) View other modes of vibration by changing
the mode in the Display Settings.
Frequency
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Review
You learned how to apply vibration analysis in visualNastran Desktop 4D.
You learned how to display the contours of different mode shapes.
You also learned how to animate the different mode shapes.
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