Hello all,

I have been having some trouble with a simple beam structure that I need to replicate and analyze for stress/deflection. So far, I have made each beam as a seperate part (dimensioning the I-shape for each and then extruding it to proper length) and then inserting each beam into the assembly, and finally mating them in the positions that represents real-life situation.  But I am running into some big problems when it somes to solidworks siimulation in terms of stress analysis. I have tried several different settings to analyze the structure but they aren't working and it will not simulate for stress. I may need to just restart completely.

What I am wondering is what is the best practice or some best practices for building and joining a simple beam structure for stress analysis? Is the way that I did it correct, or is there a more practical way of building it (using built-in solidworks parts or functions) so that the stress analysis works properly?

I'm really just a little frustrated with this model and would like to get it working and analyzed properly, so that I learn for future projects. Also, none of the built-in tutorials cover this topic.

Thank you all very much in advance for your help! Here is what I have done so far;