A new app helps designers check new or similar materials for CAD models
A new web app from materials specialist Granta Design looks to answer the often-crucial question: ‘Where is this material used?’, allowing CAD users to explore alternative materials for their designs.
Accessed by CAD plug-in, the new ‘where used?’ app enables designers selecting a material from their Granta MI database to query their PLM system to find out which of their existing products or parts already contain that material.
When considering a plastic for a new product, for example, the designer may want to know where else that grade has been used so knowledge from earlier applications can help optimize design or avoid problems.
Another use is to ask which products are at-risk when a material is rendered obsolete by regulation or supply problems. The app brings together company material and product application data to quickly answer such crucial questions via a user-friendly interface that requires no knowledge of complex product data structures.
The Granta MI: Materials Gateway plug-ins look to provide direct access to corporate materials data within CAD, CAE, and PLM. CAD users, for example, can pick a material, apply it to their model, then use the associated data for analytics, or request a variant material based on an existing specification, identifying properties they would like to change.
“We’re pleased to provide new tools and, in partnership with Siemens PLM, a new option to author materials data into PLM,” said Dr Arthur Fairfull, director of materials strategy and PLM at Granta.
“Enterprises have varying strategies for materials knowledge provision to CAD, PLM, and their product development process. These features help to support all customers in this area, whatever approach they choose.”
