May 18, 2004

Blue Ridge Numerics is please to announce that CFdesign v7.0 has been shipped to its customers around the world.

First introduced at the 2004 National Manufacturing Week, here is a summary of new fluid flow and heat transfer simulation functionality included in CFdesign v7.0.

The Solid Motion Module This Module visually displays the dynamic interaction between fluids and moving 3D solid assemblies built in an MCAD system. There are two principal types of solid body motion in the new Motion Module: Linear Motion and Rotational Motion.

The linear motion capability allows the study of the flow in and around reciprocating and sliding objects.

The rotational motion capability allows the study of the flow in and around rotating devices. The interaction with solid, non-rotating components is easily studied.

This new module also analyzes a broad range of turbomachinery applications. Examples include pumps, fans, compressors, jet engines, and turbines. Centrifugal, axial, and mixed flow geometries are all supported. Multiple rotating components within a machine can also be analyzed. Not limited to turbomachinery, the module is also fully capable of simulating rotating mixers and stirring devices.

Total Heat Flux Boundary Condition This is a heat flux condition that is applied directly, without having to consider the area of the surface. This allows the user to make parametric design changes, without recalculating the heat flux boundary condition.

Temperature Dependent Heat Generation This allows the heat generation to vary with temperature, including the simulation of a heating component that shuts off (or greatly de-powers) once a target temperature is reached or will adjust the heat input to maintain the target temperature.

Component Thermal Summary This new report provides a detailed description of the thermal results for every component in an assembly, especially useful for engineers analyzing thermal systems, and in particular to those conducting electronic cooling studies.

Joule (Ohmic) Heating Also known as resistance heating, this feature allows the user to simulate stove-top burner elements as well as electrical resistance heaters.

System-level Pump/Blower Objects A quick, accurate way to include a centrifugal pump or blower as a component within a system-level analysis.

General-Direction Distributed Resistance This feature allows a distributed resistance to be applied to any flow direction (instead of constraining it to the Cartesian directions).

Variable Emissivity With Temperature This extends the radiation model. Surface emissivity often varies with temperature, and this feature simulates these effects. This variation will be in the form of a piecewise-linear table, as well as a polynomial and inverse-polynomial table.

Heat Flux BC at a Solid-Solid Interface Useful for simulating the presence of a thin heat source sandwiched within a solid. Instead of including the geometry of such a thin device, this allows the user to apply a heat flux directly to a surface at the interface of two solids. The direction of heat will be influenced by the relative conductivity of the surrounding solids.

Direct Mesh Model Import This feature allows for the import of a finite element mesh created in a third party software, using either the Nastran or I-DEAS formats.