Guided Simulation Process

AIM streamlines the setup and execution of engineering simulation using an intuitive user interface and guided simulation process, making it easy to apply simulation early in the design process where it can form the basis for critical design decisions. Simulation process templates define task-based workflows to guide you through the entire simulation process. The AIM user interface also provides visual cues and guidances, which allow you to quickly navigate to model inputs that require attention.

Task-based workflow guides simulation process for a fluid-structure interaction simulation of a valve assembly.

Superior CAD Interfaces and Robust Meshing

ANSYS AIM enables you to simulate your native CAD geometry without translation to an intermediate geometry format. AIM includes integrated geometry modeling, which allows you to read geometry from all major CAD systems and rapidly create, repair and modify complex geometry to quickly evaluate design changes.

AIM also provides a wide range of highly robust automated meshing tools based on engineering intent, which allow you to rapidly generate a high quality mesh for complex geometry. AIM meshing options range from tetrahedral meshes to pure hexahedral meshes with inflation layers. Mesh settings like body, surface or edge sizing and defeaturing tolerances are also available to quickly create a high quality mesh for your simulation.

Accurate and Robust Fluid Flow

ANSYS AIM easily simulates flow and heat transfer for liquids and gases to rapidly evaluate the performance of your designs. AIM includes a robust flow solution that accurately evaluates key design parameters such as reducing pressure drop, calculating lift and drag coefficients, evaluating fluid loads, and predicting flow and thermal behavior.

ANSYS AIM is an ideal solution for evaluating the fluid and thermal performance of valves and other flow control devices, determining wind or fluid loads on structures, and determining temperatures in electronic components. With AIM you can quickly and accurately evaluate the flow and thermal performance of your product designs.

Accurate and Robust Stress, Vibration and Durability Analysis

ANSYS AIM allows you to easily simulate the structural performance of complex parts and assemblies to quickly validate the structural performance of your designs early in the design cycle, eliminating the need for costly physical prototypes.

ANSYS AIM includes static stress analysis including nonlinear contact, structural joints and large deflections to accurately compute static deflections and stresses for complex parts and assemblies. AIM also includes modal analysis to determine the natural frequencies and vibration characteristics of your product designs, and both stress-life and strain-life fatigue analysis to fully understand product longevity and durability.

Accurate and Robust Thermal Simulation

ANSYS AIM – Easily simulate the thermal performance of your designs to quickly evaluate temperature and heat transfer and ensure that your designs perform properly within their expected temperature ranges. AIM includes steady-state thermal conduction analysis with convection and radiation boundary conditions, which allows you to compute the temperatures and heat transfer between the components of your design and the surrounding environment.

Accurate and Robust Electromagnetic Simulation

ANSYS AIM allows you to rapidly simulate static magnetic fields and current conduction to quickly evaluate the electromagnetic performance of your designs. AIM includes a guided workflow for magnetostatic simulation with an adaptive solution that allows you to rapidly compute magnetic fields, current density, Ohmic loss, inductance, magnetic force and torque. AIM also includes easy-to-use magnetic-thermal-stress coupling, which allows you to use the Ohmic loss as a heat source to compute the temperature distribution and subsequent thermal deformations and stress. AIM is an ideal solution for simulating the electromagnetic and thermal performance in fuses, actuators, buss bars, sensors and coils.

Polymer Extrusion

Simulate a polymer extrusion manufacturing process and evaluate various aspects of the die design, reducing trial-and-error iterations for your extrusion lines, and quickly troubleshooting unexpected problems. Polymer extrusion options include simulating the flow within a die, predicting an extrudate shape, and AIM’s unique inverse die design capability allows you to predict the required die shape in order to obtain a desired extrudate shape.

Fluid-Structure Interaction

AIM allows you to rapidly evaluate the effects of fluid forces and temperatures on structural components. AIM automates the setup for one-way fluid-structure interaction, and uses highly accurate mapping algorithms to ensure that the fluid forces and solid temperatures that are applied to the structure are accurate. AIM is ideal for simulating one-way fluid-structure interaction for wind loading on structures, valves and flow control devices, and thermal performance of heat exchangers and heat sinks.

Integrated Multiphysics Simulation

AIM offers both single physics and multiphysics simulation in an integrated, modern simulation environment. When modeling your product design, it is often critical to consider multiphysics interactions ─ temperature gradients produce thermal stresses, fluid forces cause structural deformation and stress, and electric current generates resistive heating. AIM allows you to simulate all of these multiphysics effects in a unified, single window simulation environment, providing insight into how your product designs will perform in the real world.

Post-processing and Visualization

ANSYS AIM includes native post-processing and visualization tools which allow you to generate meaningful graphics and animations, making it easy to convey your simulation results to others. Contour plots, flow streamlines, isosurfaces, vector plots, reactions, realistic material rendering and calculated values are just some of the post-processing features that are available to generate both qualitative and quantitative results, allowing you to effectively communicate the results of your simulations.

Automation and Customization

ANSYS AIM helps you deploy consistent engineering best practices and automated simulation workflows within your engineering organization. AIM includes journaling and scripting based on Iron Python, which enables you to record, customize and replay your simulation.

Any simulation can be used as the basis for a replayable user-defined template, and custom physics objects and loads can be used to tailor the simulation definition to specific processes. The automation and customization capabilities of AIM are particularly useful for deploying standard simulation practices within your organization.

Powerful Expression Language

ANSYS AIM includes the ability to incorporate parameters and expressions in your simulation process. Any model input or output value can be defined as a parameter, and expressions can be used to define many properties in AIM. For example, expressions can be used to define complex boundary profiles or initial conditions for fluids physics, or to define custom post-processing quantities for either fluid or structural results. Expressions allow you to easily incorporate complex boundary and initial conditions to simulate real-world environments.

Powerful and Scalable High Performance Computing

ANSYS AIM provides you with powerful and scalable high-performance computing (HPC) options for multi-core desktop workstations. All aspects of simulation in AIM, including meshing, solution and post-processing, take advantage of parallel processing to minimize the amount of time it takes you to obtain meaningful simulation results. Parallel processing allows you to consider higher-fidelity models, and include greater geometric detail in your simulations. The result is enhanced insights into your product’s performance through higher fidelity simulation.

Integrated Material Library

ANSYS AIM provides an integrated library of both fluid and solid material properties that allows you to rapidly search for and specify material data. Constant and temperature dependent properties for common materials can be easily found by simply typing the material name and searching the material database. If a material is not available, you can specify new materials and add them to either a new or an existing material library.

Design Exploration and Optimization

ANSYS AIM includes optimization based on ANSYS DesignXplorer technology, allowing you to rapidly explore your design space and optimize your product designs. AIM supports parametric variations including parameters from CAD, material properties, boundary conditions and simulation results. By supporting parametric simulation, AIM allows you to quickly set up and evaluate multiple design variations. ANSYS DesignXplorer extends parametric simulation to drive design of experiments, goal-driven optimization, or Six Sigma analysis to investigate design robustness. The powerful design exploration and optimization capabilities of AIM help you to make informed design decisions and optimize your product designs.