Page 15 - Finite Element Analysis with ANSYS Workbench

6 Chapter 1 Introduction

equations from the governing differential equations. The derived
finite element equations are in the form of algebraic equations that
can be computed numerically. The transformation process must be
carried out correctly so that the derived algebraic equations can
yield accurate solutions.

Step 4: The finite element equations from all elements are then
assembled to become a large set of algebraic equations.
Assembling element equations must be done properly. This is
similar to placing jigsaw pieces at appropriate locations to yield the
complete picture.

Step 5: The boundary conditions of the problem are then imposed
on the set of algebraic equations before solving for the nodal
unknowns. The nodal unknowns are the displacements for
structural problem and are the temperatures for heat transfer
problem.

Step 6: Other quantities of interest can then be solved. For
structural problem, stresses in the structure can be determined after
the displacements are known. For heat transfer problem, heat
fluxes can be computed once the nodal temperatures are obtained.
The six steps above indicate that the method is quite
general and suitable for a large class of problems in science and
engineering. The three problem ingredients which are the
differential equations, boundary conditions and geometry are
handled in the third, fifth and first step of the method, respectively.

1.3 ANSYS Software

ANSYS software was first developed in 1970 by John
Swanson who was an engineer at Westinghouse Astronuclear
Laboratory. The software was originally for stress analysis of
nuclear reactor components. He later founded Swanson Analysis
System, which was named as ANSYS, Inc. His ANSYS software
then became an industry leading finite element program for
analyzing engineering problems and optimizing products. At the