Simulate Early, Simulate Often... In Rhino
Materials Definition File
Hello everyone!
I have tried editing the materials file in Notepad but SnS cannot parse my edited version, no matter how carefully I try (and I can't be that stupid with certificates in Java, C, etc).
OS = Windows Vista, Rhino v4, sr8. In my days of AutoLisp I found the old DOS editor to be reliable but that's now been replaced with Notepad. Is there a trick to this?
Thanks!
Ian
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Michael Freytag on
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Ian,
Download the latest version, it includes a material editor... you will have troubles no more! :-)
~Michael
P.S. Not that it matters, but you probably have replaced some spaces with tabs in the materials file. The reader code is REALLY naive and expects whitespace to be space characters only.
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Permalink Reply by Ian Boyd on
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Will do, thanks Michael.
In response to: Does Scan&Solve do what you need it to do? What improvements would
like to see in future versions of Scan&Solve? Have you discovered
new and exciting applications? Do you have any questions?
Oh yeah, SnS gives Rhino wings. The firm I work for manufactures high-end office chairs. The mother company is in Germany. The problem is, they have higher quality materials and processes than we do here in South Africa. We have been working very hard at playing catch up over the last year or so (I came back from a trip to Taiwan in March wondering "How on Earth are we going to match that?!")
SnS analysis, in the space of 2 weeks, has allowed us to visualise the structural calculations we were doing by hand /Excel as well as find other potential weak spots. For instance, we can quickly decide whether it would be better to place a reinforcement through a section of bent tube or re-spec the tube to a higher grade of steel, or move a drainage hole away from a hot-spot.
Word has already got out and, surprise, we have been invited to submit an article to "Engineering News" (t-h-e publication in this field in SA). The topic is goood engineering for localisation. We are looking at redesigning nylon 5-star bases to polypropylene, which is manufactured here and much cheaper than nylon. The two main problems are strength and warping out the mould. The former will be addressed with Rhino/SnS, the latter with the aid of Taguchi statistical techniques.
Once I get a chance to breath, and spend a bit of time on the forum, I will upload some good case studies (especially once validated by our R&D division in Germany). There are a couple of areas where SnS didn't have the tools needed, for instance, a reinforced tube bend. We might be able to get around that by offsetting the surface inwards in that area, but I need to figure out an offset factor that gives a meaningful result, since the two are not fused in real life but slide against one another to some extent.
We are going to have a lot of case studies for you :-) To give you some idea, when I first joined here the repair rate on new chairs was 47%. Level best, 5%. We are now typically under 1%, last month 0.2%.
In the aforementioned article, supposing we can get the design and the figures to work, we will certainly make mention of SnS and Rhino. Thanks for a great product!
Ian
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