Assembly FEMs

Video: Create an associative assembly FEM

An assembly FEM (.afm) file supports enhanced workflows for analyzing large assemblies. Assembly FEMs are similar to part assemblies. Much like the way a part assembly contains occurrence and position data for multiple component parts, an assembly FEM contains occurrence and position data for multiple component FEMs. In addition, the assembly FEM contains the connection elements that join component FEMs into a system, as well as material and physical property overrides on component FEM meshes.

Mapping component FEMs to assembly part instances

Assembly FEMs support multiple FEM occurrences—you can map the same FEM to multiple occurrences of a part in the assembly hierarchy. You can map an assembly FEM to a subassembly within a larger assembly FEM.

Edits to component FEMs are immediately reflected in the assembly FEM, and in all occurrences of the component FEM.

Note:

The assembly FEM tools in Pre/Post are based on and use many of the same commands as the Assemblies application. Before you work with assembly FEMs, you should be comfortable working with the Assemblies application. For more information, see Introduction to NX Assemblies.

Cloning assembly FEMs

You can use the Create Clone Assembly command to duplicate an assembly FEM, exactly as you can a CAD assembly. When adding the assembly to the clone operation, be sure to select the parent assembly FEM. The Create Clone Assembly command then traverses the assembly hierarchy and relationships, and creates a copy using the naming conventions you specify.

For more information about the Create Clone Assembly command, see Create Clone Assembly.

For more information about using the Create Clone Assembly command in Teamcenter Integration, see Cloning Overview.

Using external superelements in assembly FEMs

You can replace any component instance in an assembly FEM with its corresponding external superelement representation. For more information, see Using superelements in an assembly FEM.

Note:

You must solve for superelements using NX Nastran version 8 or later, or any version of Simcenter Nastran, to use them in an assembly FEM. See Superelement analysis.

You must solve for superelements using Simcenter Samcef version 18 or above to use them in an assembly FEM. See Superelements with Simcenter Samcef.

Assembly FEM versus multi-body FEM

As an alternative to an assembly FEM, you can create a single FEM file from an assembly, resulting in a FEM containing multiple polygon bodies. This approach may be more suitable when working with smaller, simpler assemblies. However, assembly FEMs provide the following advantages when working with larger, more complex assemblies:

• For large models consisting of FE data with no underlying geometry, you can improve the documentation and management of component meshes using assembly FEMs.

• You can use and reuse existing component FEMs, including legacy and imported FEM data, in multiple assembly FEMs.

• You can control the loading of component FEMs for more efficient use of resources.

• You can replace individual component FEMs with alternate mesh or geometry representations, to support what-if analyses while retaining the original component FEM data and conserving effort and resources.

• You can distribute work among members of a team. Team members or third parties provide meshes for individual parts or subassemblies, which an analyst or project leader can assemble into a full system model. Updates to component FEMs or their associated CAD data can be handled automatically by the software, or user-controlled on a part-by-part basis.

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Assembly FEMs, Simcenter 3D 2021.1 Series

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