CAD/CAM/CAE Links: Free Tutorial: Software Download: Mechanical Jobs

Engineering Toolbox - Mechanical Engineering Design and Analysis Calculator

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Wed, 4 Nov 2009 22:34:00 +0530

One of the hard task for Engineer's to remember the Mathematical Formula's and Engineering calculations. Yes, ofcourse people would refer Mechanical Engineering Pocket Book which is a reference book of rules, tables, data, and formulae, for the use of engineers & mechanics. Not to forget the unit converters which is part of daily Engineering work.

ENGRASP is an Engineering Solution provider and introduced Engineering Toolbox software. This is an advanced software tool for Mechanical Design Engineers and Analysis. ETBX covers formula's, Engineering calculations on following areas:

Solid Mechanics

Fluid Dynamics and Heat Transfer

Dynamics and Controls

Fatigue and Fracture Mechanics

Numerical Analysis

Reference Data and Utilities

It helps Engineers to interactively explore ideas during a design or evaluation study. Its user friendly interface, easy access of tools,graphical representation of results,quick solution makes it handy tool for Design Engineers to do Engineering Calculations so easily and quickly.

The beauty of this software is it has got web based help, you can analysis as project, Engineering Material database, integrated unit converter and many. Take a look at the following screen shots to understand what this software is all about.

Fig: Engineering Mechanics,Thermal Analysis,Fatigue & Fracture Mechanics Calculator

Fig: Beam analysis calculator(Static and Frequency analysis)

Fig: Graphical representation of results

I feel this is handy calculator for Mechanical Engineers since it cover many areas in Engineering like Fluid,Thermal,Mechanical,Numerical Analysis and so on. Ultimately, this software is not meant for free. You got to buy the license, before see demo of this compact Mechanical Design Engineering Calculator. Still I feel its worth buying it to have a handy Desktop Engineering Calculator for all Mechanical engineers.

Heat Treatment Process Definition, Latest Methods & Its Importance

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 20:36:00 +0530

Every Product Designer wants to make a product with better durability and strength. Heat Treatment process is one such method where in strength of product can be improved. It is used to alter the physical(Casting,Forging,Mould etc) and chemical properties(Microstructure) of a material under specific conditions. It is also used in the manufacture of many other materials, such as glass. Basically it involves the use of heating or chilling, normally to extreme temperature, to attain a desired result such as hardening or softening of a material.

Fig: Heat Treating - Aluminum Cooper Equilibrium Diagram

For example, see the effect of Heat Treatment on the microstructure and Hardness of Chromium-Nickel Steel.

From the product design point of view, Heat Treatment can also be used to alter certain manufacturability characteristics like machinability,formability,restore ductility after a cold working operation,improving hardness(Rockwell and Brinell hardness testing) and many. In a modern technology, Heat Treating is an essential step in a great percentage of manufacturing processes.

Heat treatment process differs based on product/component application and its functionality. It can provide significant savings in the weight of material required for a given component. Heat Treatment process also provides a payback by means of longer service life of treated products, fewer part replacements, reduced maintenance and machine downtime resulting in saving cost and time.

If your not familiar with Heat Treatment process and latest methods used in Industry here is the site(Wisconsin oven corporation) will help you learn about following topics:

Aging

-Aluminum Heat Treatment Terms T4,T5,T6

-Batch Aluminum Age ovens

-Continuous Aluminum Age ovens

Annealing

-Annealing purpose like machinability,cold working,improving mechanical properties

-Annealing types like Black Annealing,Flame Annealing,Graphitizing,Isothermal Annealing,Quench Annealing and Speroidizing.

-Batch Heat Treating ovens

-Continuous Heat Treating ovens

Baking

-What is Baking : Heating process in order to remove entrained gases

-Batch and Walk in ovens

-Continuous ovens

Direct Gas Fired

-Use of Direct Gas Firing

Drawing

-Draw Batch ovens

-Continuous Heat Treating ovens

Heat Treatment

Heat Treatment solution

Normalizing

Preheating

Quenching

Stress Relieving

Tempering

- Objective of Tempering : To reduce brittleness in hardened steel and to remove internal strains.

- Temperature conditions

Apart from these various Heat Treatment process definitions, you will get a chance to know about Pit type furnace,Retort Furnace etc.,

I wish this article would help to get deep insight of Heat Treating, latest methods in various alloys, and its impact on manufacturing process.

Forging & Casting Comparison,Fundamentals,Examples

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 14:29:00 +0530

In the manufacturing Industry, Engineers follows different methods to make a component. There are a variety of methods to manufacture a given product. Each has its own set of advantages and disadvantages.

Key factors influencing the selection of a manufacturing process include the following:

- Quantity of the output component

- Design of the component

- Tolerance required

- Metal Specification

- Surface finish required

- Tooling costs

- Economy of machining vs process cost

- Delivery requirements

In the article you will learn about difference between Forging and Casting.

Forging Vs Casting (Comparison)

What is Forging

What is Casting

Fundamentals of Forging - process

Fundaments of Casing - methods

Diagrammatic explanation of Forging and Casting with examples

Strength and weakness of Forging

Strength and weakness of Casting

Thanks to esi-group for providing this tip on Casting and Forging difference. Once you gone through this article then you will be in a position to select Forging or Casting on your own for your product.

Pro-e Wildfire Advance Tutorial - Part Modeling, Detailing, Pro-Mechanica,CNC

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:00:00 +0530

If you know Pro-e 2001, looking to update yourself for new version of Pro-e. Here is the superb chance for Design Engineers who are looking to learn Pro-e wildfire 2.0

This tutorial will be so much helpful for beginners and intermediate level users. This Pro-e wildfire 2.0 tutorial is provided by Dr.Zuomin Dong, University of Victoria.

Fig: Pro-e Wildfire 2.0 Advanced Tutorial(Part modeling,Assembly,Detailing,Pro-Mechanica,CAM)

Following topics are covered here:

About Pro-e Wildfire 2.0

Introduction to Pro-e Wildfire

Mouse Functions

Part Modeling

How to create simple features like rounds,holes,chamfers,revolve etc

Drawing Creation

Insert views

Add Dimensions

Other vital features like Symbols,GD&T,Notes etc

Assembly

Animation

Pro-Mechanica for structural Analysis, Sensitivity Analysis and Design Optimization

Prepare the model

Start Pro-Mechanica

Define FEA model

Run Static Analysis

Design Parameter Sensitivity Study

Design Optimization

Pro-Mechanica - Standard Static Analysis

Definition and Machining of Free Form Surfaces in Pro-e

Introduction

Variable sweep creation of Free Form surface

More complex surface and part model

Automated Generation of CNC Tool Paths using Pro-Manufacturing

Automated Generation of CNC Machining Program (G-Code)

Programming in Pro-ENGINEER

Introduction

Programming Details

An Example part and the PROGRAM window

Download Pro-e Wildfire 2.0 tutorial in PDF format for free

I guess one can understand from the above content itself how handy is this tutorial going to be for anyone. Users can easily learn Pro-e Wildfire 2.0 with ease and also get a chance to practice with some good examples.

Courtesy: (http://www.saeiss.org/ProE_Wildfire_2_Tutorial-2006.pdf)

Kindly go through the previous articles, if your looking for more on Pro-e Tutorials:

Pro-e 2001 Complete Tutorial

Pro-e Wildfire and Pro-Mechanica Reference Material

Pro-e Tips & Tricks

Pro-e Wildfire Video Tutorial

Happy Surfing guys, Keep learning CAD/FEA packages and increase you job opportunities.

Pro-e 2001 Complete Tutorial on Part, Assembly and Drawing

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 13:07:00 +0530

Enough of being into FEA software's, lets see few stuff about CAD package. I am happy to share Pro-e 2001 comprehensive tutorial absolutely free online and can be downloaded in PDF format.

Getting started with Pro/ENGINEER is a tutorial based introduction to the Pro/ENGINEER workflow. With this Tutorial, you will learn 3D Design formation, Solid part creation,Part Assembly,output of drawings and many more.

Fig: Pro-e getting started free Tutorial

This Pro-e tutorial would help following users:

- New and experienced designers with little or no CAD/CAM software experience.

- Designers who have some experience in working with Pro/Engineer, but who would like to review the basics or learn more about how to use the Pro/Engineer core functionality.

- Designers new to Pro/Engineer who have worked with other CAD/CAM applications. The philosophy and methods enabling you to capture your design ideas in Pro/ENGINEER follow a vastly different paradigm from other CAD/CAM applications

This Pro-E Learning guide is not intended to be a complete summary of basic Pro/ENGINEER techniques. The goal of the exercises is to direct you through the end-to-end design process with as few detours as possible.

Before you start the exercises in chapter 4, review chapters 1,2 and 3 to get a feel for what you will need to know about file management, the user interface, and the basic solid creation tools.

The exercises in chapter4 will guide you through creating and assembling eight parts that represent the components of cell phone. The parts start out simply and progress in complexity as you gain experience with the program. Once a technique is explained in detail, it may reappear in subsequent exercises with less detail.

Completed part,assembly and drawing files are provided with the guide. If your practice time is short, you can use these files to begin anywhere in the workflow. Using the precreated parts, you can learn the assembly or drawing tools of Pro-e.

These exercises hardly scratch the surface of Pro/ENGINEER capability. They are designed to give you a basic introduction to associative part creation and an overview of the end to end design workflow. If you finish them, learning any further aspect of Pro-ENGINEER will be much easier for you.

Thanks to PTC and ecs.rutgers.edu for providing this Pro-e 2001 Tutorial. Download Pro-e 2001 reference material now. Check out other articles on Pro-e wildfire study material and Pro-e viewer. Good luck friends.

ANSYS Workbench Guide - FEA Concepts & Terms explanation

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Wed, 7 Oct 2009 22:34:00 +0530

This article would help many of FEA users especially for the beginners,intermediate and advance users.

Everyone knows how important is to understand the fundaments of FEA before they start using any FEA package like ANSYS, NASTRAN etc.,

FEA is simply a tool to better understand how a design will perform under certain conditions. All analysis are approximations accounting for the most significant variables among many. What is almost as useful as obtaining an "exact" answer with regard to "reality", which might take a highly trained specialist a great deal of time performing what is often called a "detailed" analysis, is the trending and behavioral information that can be used to help predict and improve one's design(a basic or fundamental analysis). This approach substantially improves the overall engineering process.

And the whole article will explain about basics of FEA theory, FEA terms etc. Finally you will learnt about How to use ANSYS workbench simulation features. ANSYS workbench simulation is perfectly capable of performing detailed analysis on par with traditional FEA methods in a fraction of the time. For any analysis, detailed or fundamental, it is vital to keep in mind the nature of approximations - study the results and test the final design. Proper use of ANSYS workbench simulation will greatly reduce the number of physical tests required while allowing the designer/engineer/analyst to experiment on a wider variety of design options and improve the end product.

This is not the end of it, you will learn everything about ANSYS Workbench(Brief Tutorial). More importantly one will be in position to understand concepts and basics of FEA theory here.

Fig: ANSYS Workbench guide and FEA fundamental concepts

Fig: ANSYS Element types and its classifications

Following topics are covered in this ANSYS Workbench PDF Tutorial:

What is FEA

Pre-Processing

ANSYS Workbench Meshing

Solving

ANSYS Workbench Solving

Post-Processing (Interpretation of Results,Report Generation)

ANSYS Workbench advance Post-processing

Types of Engineering Analysis

Stress and Strain - Basics

Users of FEA

Advanced

Intermediate

Fundamental

In What areas can FEA help

Engineering Assumptions for ANSYS Workbench

General Assumptions and Limitations

FEA Terms and Definitions

Find the PDF of ANSYS Fundamental FEA concepts and applications

Check out previous article on ANSYS:

ANSYS Workbench and Classical version Tutorial

ANSYS Tips and Tricks

ANSYS Workbench Tutorial with examples

Thanks to Wildfea and ANSYS Inc in providing this useful Tutorial for ANSYS users. This will certainly help engineers a lot to understand FEA concepts and learn How to use ANSYS Workbench tools. Hope you enjoy this FEA reference material.

ANSYS Structural & Thermal solved problems - step by step Tutorial

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 22:04:00 +0530

ANSYS exercise files with solutions: The title says it all, this session we are going to see ANSYS solved problems with step-by-step guide. These ANSYS tutorials will be helpful for beginners and entry level advance users. FEA users will learn about Structural (2D&3D),Dynamic and Thermal analysis using ANSYS classic version software.

Structural Analysis -

Simple 3-D Truss

2D Truss with inclined support and support element

2D Continuous Beam with distributed load

Plane stress analysis

Axisymmetric model(water tank)

3D Structure with Shell elements Dynamic analysis

Non-linear analysis

Thermal analysis - Steady state

All these tutorial are available in PDF format. Here user will learn about FEA approach,modeling,meshing,defining boundary conditions,post processing,report generation etc.,

Fig: ANSYS Problem definition with geometry and material property

Fig: FEA modeling and Boundary condition

Fig: ANSYS post processing tutorial

This is unique study material for ANSYS users unlike other tutorials available. Thanks to memorial university in providing these tutorial. If users not to able to access PDF files, check out their site to download ANSYS tutorial in word document format.

ANSYS workbench Tutorial with solved problems

ANSYS Demo examples

ANSYS Exercise problems

ANSYS Knowledgebase - FAQ's

I wish everyone of you certainly enjoyed and learnt ANSYS FEA modeling. All the best.

Hypermesh Video PDF Tutorial for Beginners - Tips & Tricks

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 21:44:00 +0530

Job opportunities for CAE engineer is reaching its high while comparing to other stream of Mechanical Engineers. This change in trend is only recent times when usability of FEA software's entered all application areas. This is quite visible in medicine field where scientists and medical experts started to develop surgical instruments.

If you ask your senior colleague about FEA software's when they learnt it, they would be answering you FEA software has modeling,meshing and analysis together. As software capability and need for FEA software increased, Engineers had software for meshing,modeling and analysis individually. One of the familiar Meshing and analysis package is Hypermesh by Altair.

Hypermesh's user-interface is easy to learn and supports many CAD geometry and finite element model files - increasing interoperability and efficiency. Advanced functionality within Hypermesh allows users to efficiently mesh high fidelity models. This functionality includes user defined quality criteria and controls, morphing technology to update existing meshes to new design proposals, and automatic mid-surface generation for complex designs with of varying wall thicknesses. Automated tetra-meshing and hexa-meshing minimizes meshing time while batch meshing enables large scale meshing of parts with no model clean up and minimal user input.

I can say its somewhat tough to find study material or Tutorial for Hypermesh. But not many people know getting Hypermesh Tutorial is easy. You don't have to search in net just get help and demo files in Altair website.

Video demonstration on Hyperworks products
Exercise for beginners in FEM
Hypermesh - Getting started
About Radioss/Linear
Hyperview,Hypergraph,Motion view - Getting started
Hypermesh - Exporting node sets to Ansys
Hypermesh - Introduction to Scalar spring elements
Hyperform - Tube bending
Hyperform - Hydroforming
Stress Analysis of a thin walled pressure vessel - geometry import,clean up,editing surfaces,shell & solid meshing,boundary conditions,post processor
Hypermesh/Radioss - Including self weight in analysis
Hex meshing with Hypermesh - Basics and moderate users
Hypermesh - Assigning variable thickness to mid surface shell elements

The Hypermesh tutorials for above topics contains Video demo as well as PDF file format. These study materials are especially meant for students including engineers who want to study Hypermesh being beginner.

These online tutorials are best viewed in video form. If you have an unreliable internet connection, you should download the PDF version instead. The tutorials are based on queries raised by users of HyperWorks and cover several HyperWorks modules: HyperMesh, HyperView, HyperGraph, OptiStruct, Radioss/Linear, Radioss/Explicit, MotionView and MotionSolve. They also cover different applications - finite element analysis, stress analysis, analysis of mechanisms or multi-bodies, dynamic analysis.

Engineers can also find projects in FEA,discussion forum, Tips&Tricks,get answers from experts,webinars here in Altair student website.

Also check out Hypermesh Tutorial in my previous article. I wish this video Tutorial of Hyperworks products would help you to shine your career and increase your job opportunities in Hypermesh.

Top 20 countries for Mechanical Engineering Jobs & Career growth

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 18:03:00 +0530

This topic would certainly help you to decide in which country you want to work. Certainly Engineering professionals would prefer the destination where they are going to work. This is because many countries are very conducive for Engineering companies due to government policies,infrastructure,skill set available and so on. But we will take a closer at countries which favors Mechanical Engineering career development and job opportunities.

According to news reports, Germany stands out first in exporting Engineering equipments and machines, rate has increased by 11% in the financial year 2007. German export of mechanical engineering products increased four years in a row through 2007.

Top countries provide Mechanical Engineering career growth:

Germany
USA
UAE & Middle East
Japan
Italy
China

This has made Germany to rank first position for Mechanical Engineering career opportunities. Everyone also know about German products are the best for innovative and complex engineering.

Next comes, USA with well known for its nano technology and most engineering companies presence. According to ASME report, the U.S. Department of Labor expects that America will need as many as 87,000 new mechanical engineers by the time today's high school seniors graduate.On average, a mechanical engineer who is just starting out in the profession can expect to earn about $51,000 a year. Within several years, that annual salary can jump to an average of over $70,000.

In third position,UAE and Middle East countries welcomes Mechanical Engineering Industry and offers much more career growth for mechanical engineers.

Not to forget Japan is far behind, holding fourth position brings bright future Mechanical Engineering professionals.

Italy and China take fifth and sixth position respectively. These countries provide good career growth and high salaries with challenging jobs for Mechanical Engineering professionals.

The above table represents Top 20 countries in Engineering provides career growth for mechanical professionals,taken as of the latest bimonthly update of essential science indicators attracted the highest total; citations to their papers published in Thomson Reuters journals of Engineering published over an 11 year period starting from 1998 December till 2008.

Ultimately, all these reports indicates that there is bright future for Mechanical Engineering graduates with more career options and high pay salaries. These professionals have challenging tasks ahead in innovating micro and large machines for the future generation. Read Future of Mechanical Engineering in 2028 by ASME.

Different Engineering Degree options - Career Opportunities

noreply@blogger.com (Digi-cad) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 09:46:00 +0530

Engineering is the most spoken career option after your school in the recent times. This is because due to globalization and need of Engineering professionals globally.

Here comes the question, If I am going to choose Engineering as my career then what are the different Engineering field that I can opt. This is something tricky again. Many of us know, Mechanical,Civil,Electrical are the core part of Engineering. As we entered modern age, our need and specialization also grew. This has lead to think of other Engineering science field like Nuclear,Biomedical,Aerospace,Industrial Engineering etc., Interestingly not all university offer this kind of courses, student has to check the college website.

If you like to know Engineering colleges in India, checkout Top 25 ranked Engineering colleges in India.

As you can see in the above figure, you can information about each Engineering career options. Engineering fields include:

Aerospace Engineering
Agricultural Engineering
Architectural Engineering
Biomedical Engineering
Chemical Engineering
Civil Engineering
Computer Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Engineering Management
Engineering Science/Physics
General Engineering
Industrial Engineering
Manufacturing Engineering
Materials Engineering
Mechanical Engineering
Mining Engineering
Naval Architectural Engineering
nuclear Engineering
Ocean Engineering
Petroleum Engineering
Software Engineering
System Engineering

You can get this brief intro about these Engineering field from Teachers Domain.com. Hope this helps students to take decision on their Engineering Career Opportunities.