Week - 8 - Morphing

MORPHING IN ANSA

INTRODUCTION:-

Morphing is one of the important tools in ANSA which is used to bring a change in the shape of any part.

A morphed part is not considered as the final product to be manufactured however,it brings in the new idea that can be part into,to bring some significant changes it gives a new idea to a design engineer,to make possible changes and to make a more effective product.In this work, a morphing tool is used on a sheet metal part to understand the way of using it and see how effective it can be.

Aim:-

To use the morphing tools on a sheet metal part

Objective:-

To study and understand the way of using the morphing tools.

Procedure:-

Before initiating the procedure to use the morphing tools,firstly it was required to clean the geometry Imported,as shown in Fig 1.Morphing tools can be used on CAD geometry (or) the FE model.Here,in this work,it was used on a CAD model.when the geometry was imported it was full of errors present in it.Therefore ,it had to clean before proceeding with any further procedure.

                                     Fig 1. sheet metal is taken to study the morphing tools.

To rectify the errors, a command was given to join all the neighbouring cons,using the Faces~TOPO tool, in the TOPO deck.Though the "TOPO" tool was used to clean some errors.it was still having some triple cons errors present near the bolt stem.

                                                Fig 2. Geometry check Manager.

Now,when the geometry is free from all errors.it was ready to try the morphing tools on it. the green icon is the morphing deck icon.once it is selected,the morphing window gets active which is also indicated at the right - down corner,in working space.

As said earlier,morphing tools are used to change the shape if design irrespective of its dimensions available.Therefore to change the shape of any part of the complete body,it has to be brought in a morphing box.

A morphing box is a cubical region with which if a body is kept,that particular region only will go under shape change and rest of the shape of design will remain as it is, In the morphing deck and boxes section,the NEW option is used to create the box.When the New is selected a window opens In that window, geometry has to be selected , and ortho has to be selected as the box type.

Fig 3.Window to create morphing box.

After selecting the options, a specific region of the geometry has to be selected to which shape has to be made,once selected and hit enter, a green coloured box gets created the green coloured box is the morphing box.The shape change would occur in that specific region only to which box has enclosed.

                          Fig 4. Selection made to change the shape.

Now to bring changes in the shape of the design,in the ' Box Morphing ' section. ' Move is there when the 'Move' option is selected a window would appear .Which asks about the points of the box which has to be moved Therefore,the nodal points have to be selected by whole selection desired shape change would come.In this work,nodal points that were selected.

When hit enter,by clicking the middle mouse key,it results in free movement,Any shape can be given to that specific region. when it becomes sure that which shape has to be kept,hitting enter would result in the final shape change of that region.It appears as shown in fig 4.

                      Fig 5. Morphed feature of the geometry.

It  can also be seen that the base of the first feature appears good looking,However,the other three are still having distortion at their bases shape change would result in some geometric distortions which can be corrected manually.The box created to change the shape can also be split to create more nodal points to bring more effective shape change,using the split tool in the boxes section.The split box is shown in fig 11 using the extra nodal points more shape changes brought into the geometry and it started appearing.

                                  Fig 6. The morphing box was split,creating 16 more nodal points.

                                 Fig 7.The shape change brought into geometry using more nodal points.

Learning outcomes:-

1) Morphing a geometry ( or ) more FE model doesnot require the dimension to bring some changes in the design.

2) Morphing any product could result in some geometric distortions,therefore it has to be corrected manually.

3) A morphing tool could result in a good tool to bring some effective design change in a product if has one has both the knowledge of using the tool and creativity.

4) Morphing could give an idea to think about the way to change the shape.

Conclusion:-

The morphing tool is used to change the shape of the design of any part,to get the general idea of the changes that can be made that could bring a more effective performance ( or ) can give good aesthetics.