The 29th SIMULIA Regional User Meeting was held on the 2-3rd November at the Park Royal Hotel, Cheshire.

This year we expanded the typical conference format to include and deliver more content to you than ever before. Roger Keene opened the first day with executive remarks presenting to a very full first session,. This was followed by the first keynote speaker, Andy Ibbotson from Airbus, who gave an excellent overview of how SIMULIA applications on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform are being deployed.

The day then split into two streams compiling of six parallel sessions, the technical stream hosted five technology updates and five advanced seminars. These sessions were specifically designed to provide as much technical content to customers as possible in order to refresh skills and understanding. The parallel strategy stream provided attendees with a platform to discuss how new technologies provide opportunities to drive process change in the deployment of simulation and the resulting business benefits. This session included an excellent presentation from Mike Brown of Jaguar Land Rover which highlighted how SIMULIA applications on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform are driving improvements in simulation productivity.

The first day concluded with our traditional conference banquet where we were joined by 120 customers for an evening of food, wine and some quite competitive, catapult building fun (a picture is worth a thousand words :) .

The second day began with the second keynote speaker, Michael Hutchings from BAE Systems Submarines, who presented on how FEA is deployed for Submarine design, build and in-service support. This was closely followed by 16 customer user papers from a variety of industries (the customer papers are available to download below). The SIMULA technical team provided helpful hints and tips during the new applications and technology presentation, which discussed the current enhancements within the SIMULIA portfolio. Additionally, the SIMULIA team presented a captivating presentation proving how innovation can be accelerated using the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform.

The conference concluded with an interesting Q&A session and the, now traditional, take away coffee and Krispy Kreme’s!  

A huge thank you goes to our conference sponsors, CEI, SSA, Intrinsys, Granta Design, NAFEMS, Endurica, Simpleware and Lenovo without whom our conferences would not be the same!

Finally, a huge thank you goes to you, our attendees! We hope you enjoyed the conference as much as the  we do and we really hope to see you again at an event in the near future.

Conference Photos

Links to customer papers:

User Paper Session 1 - Dynamics

• Anqi Chen, Steel Construction Institute, Advanced numerical analysis of instrument boxes and ISO container subjected to blast loading from vapour cloud detonations

• Dheeraj Dhillon, Jaguar Land Rover, Development of a virtual multi-axial simulation table in Simpack to enhance the prognosis of powertrain mounting system loads for durability applications.

• Mohammed Webhi, Network Rail, Using Finite Element Modeling as a tool to design bridge transition zones for railway tracks

• David Winfield, Freudenberg Oil & Gas, The Writing’s on the Wall

User Paper Session 2 – Methods                

• Bob Johnson, REAL, Using Abaqus to investigate out-of-plane bending in offshore mooring chains

• Robert Luo, Trelleborg, Hyperelastic models for polymer creep and stress relaxation using Abaqus

• Gaetano Arena, Bristol University, Modeling Fluid-Structure Interactions with Coupled Eulerian-Lagrangian Meshes

• Chris Smethurst,  BAE Systems Submarines, Modeling fluid-filled pipes in Abaqus

User Paper Session 3 - Manufacturing    

• Graeme Short, SSA, Simulation of wear in a decanter centrifuge using smoothed particle hydrodynamics

• Robert Done, Crown, Accounting for anisotropy in beverage can manufacture

• David Tanner, Atkins, Multi-stage thermo-mechanical manufacturing process simulation using Abaqus

• Damaso De Bono, TWI Ltd, Simulations to Support Additive Manufacturing Technology: From Metal Micro-lattices to Process Modelling

 User Paper Session 4 - Optimisation/process automation

• Tie Li, Ford, Shape Optimization to improve fatigue safety factor in engine cylinder head design

• Thomas Kopsch, Cambridge University, Design and optimization of a passive flow control device

• Ian Shilling &  Jithu Jose Michael, Jaguar Land Rover  Feasibility Study:-  Mass Optimisation of a forged steel connecting rod

• Sam Paul, Subsea7, Mapping the Maximum Allowable Production Operating Envelope for a Multi-Constrained Oil and Gas Flowline System using Isight