Structural materials are used in many industrial sectors to manufacture final products and the materials used must comply with a wide variety of requirements. Particularly high demands are usually placed on the mechanical load-bearing capacity of these materials. However, properties such as thermal and electrical conductivity or thermal expansion are also of great importance. A close inspection of these properties provides the necessary information for successful product development in both material and component development.
The potential for improvement resides in the microstructure
With GeoDict, the properties of a material can be analyzed, developed, and simulated using a realistic 3D model on the microstructure. The simulation results help in the further development process to utilize the full potential of the materials and to identify and eliminate possible weak points.
Simulations reduce time and costs
Processes in research and production are more efficient and flexible with GeoDict:
- Development costs for materials are significantly reduced because the number of necessary experiments and prototypes is reduced by running simulations.
- Simulations offer valuable insights into the internal processes and modes of operation of materials that laboratory tests cannot provide.
- Materials that typically cannot be manufactured without major production adjustments or investments are easily developed and tested digitally.
- GeoDict enables individual parameter studies to be carried out and thus, also meets the highest scientific demands.
Realistic 3D models of materials
Precise simulations require digital 3D models that truly represent the microstructure with all relevant features.
In GeoDict, 3D models of a microstructure are generated in two ways:
1. As import from three-dimensional image data, using the ImportGeo-Vol module:
- µCT scans
- X-ray microscopy scans
- FIB-SEM scans
2. As digital 3D models, using GeoDict digital Material Design structure generators:
- Fiber structures (unidirectional semi-finished products such as tapes and rovings, multidirectional multilayer fabrics, nonwovens, short and long fibers)
- Woven fabrics (twill, plain, and atlas weaves, complex freely defined weaves)
- Foam structures (open- and closed-cell foams)
- Grain structures (for ceramics and metal structures)
- Particles (in filled resins also with formation of agglomerates)
Analysis of relevant properties
In the development of innovative materials, such as composites, foams, ceramics, and many more, the determination of their properties plays a major role. Only in this way can materials be tailored to an application and their full potential exploited. GeoDict offers suitable solutions for digital material analysis:
- Geometric properties: pore size distribution, fiber volume content, fiber diameter distribution and fiber length distribution, through-paths and pore network analysis, permeability
- Physical properties: thermal and electrical conductivity
- Mechanical properties: anisotropic stiffness tensor, large deformations, damage and failure behavior
In our experience, GeoDict with FiberFind-AI is the most powerful software for generating precise FE models for Abaqus from µCT scans.Transferring nonwoven data into highly accurate fibre models for deformation simulations is a matter of minutes, not hours or days!
Dr.-Ing. Dipl.-Math. techn. Gunnar Possart, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
