Matt Suskihas made good progress using beam elements in ANSYS - much faster meshes and solves, allowing for more iterations in shorter time frames
Currently cannot create a mesh using multiple tube profiles (i.e. square, larger/smaller rounds, etc.), as ANSYS tends to mesh all members as the most common/prominent profile
FEA boundary conditions are easy enough to define by collapsing mounting features to singular point loads: the point loads still are TBD, but will hopefully make the final chassis iterations faster
We are due for a Solidworks update come start of August
IST is planning to deploy Win10 and new SW versions to all school computers at some point this term, so our upgraded version should be selected to match
Devon Copeland and Adam Marchand will decide on a CAD "freeze" to ensure all team members can update to a new license and version at the same time to avoid backwards compatibility issues
Action items
Adam Marchand reach out to contacts at ANSYS for help with new chassis FEA procedure issues
Adam Marchand contact Paula regarding Solidworks upgrades in CAD room, and pick version to match
Devon Copeland contact Corbeau to verify mounting points
Former user (Deleted) look into workflow for panelization in Rhino/Solidworks/Speedform