This section provides brief descriptions of some of the most significant new capabilities and enhancements available in Abaqus 6.11; refer to the table of contents for a complete list of new features.
Analytical mapped fields in Abaqus/CAE allow you to import discrete and discontinuous parameter data from a point cloud data file generated by a third-party CAE application or from an Abaqus output database file to define spatially varying parameter values (“Mapped analytical fields in Abaqus/CAE,” Section 4.4).
Shape and topology optimization can now be performed in the Abaqus/CAE Topology Optimization Module, a new product offering available in Abaqus/CAE. This functionality requires an additional license to submit an optimization process for analysis (“Structural optimization in Abaqus/CAE,” Section 4.2).
Abaqus/CAE now offers assembled fasteners to simplify modeling in systems that contain a large number of fasteners such as bolts, rivets, or screws by allowing you to define a complex fastener behavior once and replicate that behavior multiple times in your model (“Assembled fasteners in Abaqus/CAE,” Section 4.3).
Pressure penetration loading, including support in Abaqus/CAE, is now available for three-dimensional models (“Three-dimensional pressure penetration loading,” Section 9.1).
You can now use Abaqus/CAE to create substructures, to import substructures into your model database, to add substructures to your assembly, and to recover substructure data during an analysis (“Substructures in Abaqus/CAE,” Section 4.1).
The new parameter update capability for the CATIA V5 Associative Interface allows you to work exclusively in Abaqus/CAE after importing a model from CATIA V5 while keeping the original CATIA V5 model up to date with any geometric changes (“Bidirectional import of parameters using the CATIA V5 Associative Interface,” Section 5.1).
Material calibration, which is the process of deriving Abaqus material behaviors from sets of material test data, can now be performed in Abaqus/CAE (“Material calibration in Abaqus/CAE,” Section 7.1).
Modeling enhancements in Abaqus/CAE include the option to mirror a part and retain the complete feature creation history and the ability to edit those features (“Adding a mirror feature to a part,” Section 4.12).
Mesh stack orientation enhancements, including assigning a stack direction based on the orientation of a reference face and assigning stack orientations that are independent of the sweep direction, are now available in Abaqus/CAE (“Mesh stack orientations,” Section 12.2).
In Abaqus/Standard you can now obtain simultaneous solutions for the temperature, electric potential, and stress/displacement fields (“Coupled thermal-electrical-structural analysis,” Section 6.1).
A smoothed particle hydrodynamic modeling technique has been introduced in Abaqus/Explicit to model violent free-surface fluid flows and extremely high deformation/obliteration of solid structures (“Smoothed particle hydrodynamics,” Section 6.3).
New scalable thread-parallel execution capability of the AMS eigensolver significantly improves the performance of frequency extraction analyses (“AMS eigensolver performance improvement,” Section 6.8).
The iterative solver algorithm offers improved handling of dense linear constraints to better achieve convergence (“Enhanced iterative solver capability to handle dense linear constraints,” Section 6.9).
More efficient and robust edge-to-edge contact interactions in general contact are available in Abaqus/Explicit (“Edge-to-edge general contact enhancement,” Section 11.3).
The direct sparse solver in Abaqus/Standard can use compute-capable GPGPU cards to reduce the run time for equation solution (“GPGPU direct solver acceleration,” Section 3.1).
The surface-based fluid cavity capability is now available in Abaqus/Standard to analyze the coupling between the deformation of a structure and the pressure exerted by a contained fluid on the structure (“Surface-based fluid cavities in Abaqus/Standard,” Section 4.5).
You can now perform a time-harmonic eddy current analysis in Abaqus/Standard that accounts for full coupling between electric and magnetic fields (see “Time-harmonic eddy current analysis,” Section 6.2).
Contact stress output is more accurate and less noisy for second-order surfaces (“Contact stress output improvements,” Section 13.13).
Output enhancements were implemented to reduce the size of the output database, including changing the extrapolation and interpolation schemes in Abaqus/Standard for three commonly used output variables: stress, Mises equivalent stress, and equivalent pressure stress (“Output database size reduction,” Section 13.3).
Timoshenko beams in Abaqus/Standard now support linearly tapered general beam sections and standard library sections (“Tapered beams and improved mass formulation,” Section 8.1).
You can use a scalable thread-parallel implementation of modal steady-state dynamic analysis to reduce the analysis time on shared memory parallel machines (“Performance improvement for modal steady-state dynamic analysis,” Section 6.21).
Enhancements to the extended finite element method (XFEM) include support for a user-defined damage initiation criterion and for simulation of low-cycle fatigue using XFEM and the direct cyclic approach (“Continued enhancements to the XFEM-based crack propagation capability,” Section 6.5).
You can obtain improved accuracy for modeling contact interactions with gasket elements (“Penalty stiffness for contact involving gaskets,” Section 11.2).
Abaqus/CFD provides support for the RNG k–
turbulence model, which is a two-equation model based on renormalization group theory that accounts for the effects of small scales of motion (“New RNG k–epsilon turbulence model for fluid dynamic analysis,” Section 6.6).
Abaqus/Aqua loading to apply wave drag and buoyancy loading to structures modeled using pipe and beam elements is now available with Abaqus/Explicit (“Explicit dynamics analysis using Abaqus/Aqua,” Section 9.6).
Several enhancements are available for visualizing results:
Contour plots of linear beam section stresses (“Plotting contours for beam geometry,” Section 13.1).
Streamlines can be used to visualize the velocity and vorticity of fluid flow in an Abaqus/CFD analysis (“Streamlines,” Section 13.2).
New options for probing the model offer more customization and improve usability (“Enhanced query options for probing the model,” Section 13.4).
Table 1–1 Overview of platform and product support.
| Platform | Availability | Supported products |
|---|---|---|
| Windows/x86-32 | DVD | Interactive and analysis products |
| Windows/x86-64 | DVD | Interactive and analysis products |
| Linux/x86-64 | DVD | Interactive and analysis products |
| Linux/Itanium | ftp | Abaqus/Standard and Abaqus/Explicit |
| AIX/Power | ftp | Analysis products |
For current and complete details on supported Abaqus products and platforms, including platform information for add-on products, interfaces, and translators, refer to the Abaqus systems information available through the Support page at www.simulia.com. For more information, see Appendix A, “System requirements,” of the Abaqus Installation and Licensing Guide.
The remaining chapters in this book provide details on these and other new features of Abaqus 6.11. In addition to the enhancements listed here, most of the known bugs in Abaqus 6.10 are corrected.