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Beth Stackpole

SpaceClaim, Blue Ridge Numerics Partner Around Upfront CFD

So what if you’re not a CAD operator or an analyst dedicated to crunching computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and thermal transfer simulations. Blue Ridge Numerics  and CAD newcomer SpaceClaim Corp. are teaming up to enpower engineers to conduct design-driven flow and thermal trade-off studies without having to be CAD operators.

The goal of the partnership is to promote more CFD testing and simulations upfront in the design process in lieu of physical prototyping. Some engineers who know CFD don’t necessarily know CAD and how to create 3D models, which eliminates upfront CFD in the mainstream product design process. SpaceClaim, launched last April, targets engineers and designers not necessarily versed in parametric 3D CAD operations with a host of features and user interface gadgets that can deliver sophisticated modeling capabilities without knowledge of sophisticated commands.

Blue Ridge Numerics’ CFD audience is similar. While traditional CFD requires an extremely high-level skill set (a level of expertise that is rapidly diminishing, company officials say), Blue Ridge Numerics’ focus is putting CFD capabilities into the hands of the guys on the front lines who can make the most impact—typically the garden variety, multi-discipline engineer, says Jim Spann, the company’s vice president of marketing.

Models can be built or imported into SpaceClaim, optimized with the new CFdesign for SpaceClaim, then shared with designers working in other CAD tools, including Autodesk Inventor, Dassault CATIA and PTC Pro/ENGINEER, among others.