Configuring Creo Elements/Direct Finite Element Analysis

This section describes how to configure the Finite Element Analysis environment.
There are three different areas which can be customized independently of standard Creo Elements/Direct Modeling customization settings:

Customization files:

There is a special customization file for changing parameters and settings for Finite Element Analysis:

"personality/sd_customize/DesignAdvisor/da_config" and/or "personality/<lang>/sd_customize/DesignAdvisor/da_config"

This file should not be edited, as your changes will be overwritten by a future update of Finite Element Analysis. Thus customizations should be done in a copy. This file can be used for the same settings and can be used hierarchically for different levels of customization (i.e. user, site or corporate specific).

To customize Finite Element Analysis, create a copy of da_config within one of the directories mentaioned below and edit the copy as required. If you want to:

You can then edit the file as required. When Finite Element Analysis is activated, each of the three different customization files is tried to be loaded under the paths, mentioned above in the order used above. Note: When using Creo Elements/Direct Modeling, the latest visited directory is saved as an registry entry. When starting up Creo Elements/Direct Modeling the next time, the current working directory is set back to what is was in the previous session. As a consequence of that, the current directory will usually not be the startup directory any longer when Finite Element Analysis is activated. If a da_config file is found there it is loaded as a last chance. This is especially important to know if you activate Finite Element Analysis automatically from within your pesd_customize file.

See also Checking the Current Configuration

To Configure the Data File Location

By default, Finite Element Analysis looks for some data files in the directory personality and/or personality/DesignAdvisor. If you want to use a different location for the data files, use the command:
(ferrum::ferrum-set-rootdir "<your dir>")

In particular, the following files must be in the path:

To Configure the Solver Scratch Directory

Finite Element Analysis installations do behave slightly different with respect whether they are used locally or as remote solver. It is recommended to use a directory on a local disk for that purpose and if you have multiple fast disk drives within your system to use a different one than the one the directory pointed at by the environment variable METMPDIR or TEMP.

The following table is a guideline to how much disk space is needed dependent on the size of the model. Note that when using H-adaptivity, the values below only refer to the first iteration with the initial mesh. Subsequent iterations typically require considerably more disk space.
Model size Overall needed Disk space
5000 nodes 60 MB
15000 nodes 200 MB
20000 nodes 300 MB
30000 nodes 450 MB
60000 nodes 1200 MB
150000 nodes 4000 MB
300000 nodes 8500 MB
Note: (1) The Solver's input/output files are written into a temporary directory below the temporary directory used by Creo Elements/Direct Modeling, i.e. C:/TEMP/ , unless specified differently by the environment variables METMPDIR or TMP. See the general Creo Elements/Direct Modeling customization documentation for more information.
The sequence of precedence is:
  1. The directory specified by the environment variable ${METMPDIR},
  2. The directory specified by the environment variable ${TMP},
  3. C:/TEMP/


(2) It is highly recommended to use local discs for the scratch directory. Discs mounted over the network (like NFS, ...) can dramatically slow down performance and the analysis will in many cases not complete successfully.

To Configure the Location of the Solver's Start-Scripts

Finite Element Analysis assumes the following default path for the start-script of the Solver (a MSC/NASTRAN subset):
<installation directory>/CoCreate/Design Analysis/NASTRAN_V70.5/msc705/i386/nastran.exe. If the Finite Element Analysis package has been installed on the machine, this setting will be fetched from the registry.

If the Solver is in a different directory, you can configure the start-script with the following command:
(ferrum::ferrum-set-nastranexe "<your dir>/msc705/i386/nastran.exe")

To Configure the NASTRAN Real Memory

You can configure the amount of memory resources NASTRAN is allowed to use. The default (16 MB) is usually sufficient for small to medium models. Larger models however will often need a higher value. You can increase the NASTRAN real memory setting with the following command:

 (ferrum::ferrum-set-nastran-real-mem <value_in_MB>)

The following table shows examples for recommended real memory settings dependent on the mesh size for Linear Static analysis. When staying below these values the analysis will usually still run, but performance may decrease considerably. On the other hand increasing the real memory setting for medium to large models will increase performance.
 
Model size Recommended real memory
5000 nodes 16 MB (default value)
15000 nodes 32 MB
20000 nodes 36 MB
30000 nodes 48 MB
60000 nodes 128 MB
150000 nodes 336 MB
300000 nodes 560 MB

Note:

Customizing Study Reports

To configure the used logo

Finite Element Analysis uses the Creo Elemenst/Direct logo supplied with the installation as the default logo in study reports. If you want to use your company logo, create a GIF file and set a reference to it with the following command:
(ferrum::ferrum-docu-logo "<your company logo>")

To configure the default project description

Finite Element Analysis uses the file project_description.html in the directory specified when creating the study report as a reference to the project description. Normally you should specify a full link destination in http-syntax to refer to the project description with the following command:
(ferrum::ferrum-docu-project "<the link destination>")

To configure the default study report directory

By default, Finite Element Analysis uses the directory C:/TEMP/ as the default study report directory. If you want to use a different directory as a default, you can specify it with the following command:
(ferrum::ferrum-docu-docu-dir "<the head-level directory>")

For each study report, a directory will be created within this default directory.

To configure the author of the study report

Finite Element Analysis retrieves the name of the author of the study report from the Operating System, e.g. from the database of User Manager. If you don't want to use this source (for example, because it contains home phone numbers or office locations) you can customize Finite Element Analysis with the following command:
(ferrum::ferrum-docu-author "<your name, as it should be incorporated into the reports>")

Checking the Current Configuration

You can check the current Finite Element Analysis configuration by entering any of the commands into the command line without a parameter and then use the display functionality to show the current value of the required setting:
(display (ferrum::ferrum<required-setting>))

This pops up the Creo Elements/Direct Modeling display box and shows the currently-set value for the required setting.

The most commonly-used commands are:

Configuration file for remote solving

For remote solving a special configuration file da_server_config is needed. Please copy the customized file:

From: Documents and Settings/<user>.<domain>/Application Data/CoCreate/OSD_Modeling/<major>.<minor>/DesignAdvisor/da_config
To: Documents and Settings/NetworkService/Application Data/CoCreate/OSD_Modeling/<major>.<minor>/DesignAdvisor/da_server_config
Remark: If the file is not found there it will be searched in .../All Users/... as well on Windows 7 or in .../Default User/... on Windows Server 2003.

This file (da_server_config) allows the same settings as the da_config files mentioned above. This file is only read if Finite Element Analysis runs as a server for remote solving, otherwise the normal da_config files are read. The normal da_config files are not read if Finite Element Analysis runs as a server. When running in server mode Finite Element Analysis needs some additional settings in order to start up NASTRAN properly:

We have found many influences for the place the various Windows flavors are looking for the configuration files. Instead of providing a table of places looked at by the various flavours, we have provided a small tool. 


;; 1.) startup the modules FE_Analysis and Remote
;; ....
;; 2.) Start the Dispatcher if not already running
;; 
;; 3.) configure the Remote module
;;
;; 4.) and load the tool
(load "goodies")(load "remote_solver_check")
;; will give you a toolbox button "CheckRemoteSolver", which will create
;; a small analysis model and send it off to the dispatcher.
;; When the job is finished you will see a list of places where the
;; remote system tried to find the configuraion files

On Windows:
      (FERRUM::FERRUM-EXTEND-ENV-PATH ".")

Please refer to the da_server_config as well.

Further Information

Additional information can be found under the following:

Legal Notes

Trademarks

MSC and MSC/ are registered trademarks and service marks of The MacNeal-Schwendler Corporation. NASTRAN is a registered trademark of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. MSC/NASTRAN is an enhanced, proprietary version developed and maintained by The MacNeal-Schwendler Corporation.

Other company, brand, or product names mentioned, but not explicitly marked as trademarks, are not to be rated as free but as property of their respective owners.