Finite Element Analysis offers knowledge to foretell how a seal product will perform under sure conditions and might help determine areas the place the design could be improved with out having to check multiple prototypes.
Here we clarify how our engineers use FEA to design optimum sealing solutions for our customer applications.
Why can we use Finite Element Analysis (FEA)?
Our engineers encounter many crucial sealing purposes with complicating influences. Envelope measurement, housing limitations, shaft speeds, pressure/temperature ratings and chemical media are all utility parameters that we should consider when designing a seal.
In isolation, the impact of those software parameters within reason straightforward to foretell when designing a sealing answer. However, whenever you compound a variety of these factors (whilst often pushing some of them to their upper limit when sealing) it’s essential to predict what will happen in actual software conditions. Using FEA as a device, our engineers can confidently design after which manufacture robust, reliable, and cost-effective engineered sealing options for our customers.
Finite Element Analysis (FEA) allows us to understand and quantify the results of real-world circumstances on a seal half or assembly. It can be used to establish potential causes the place sub-optimal sealing efficiency has been noticed and can additionally be used to guide the design of surrounding parts; particularly for products corresponding to diaphragms and boots the place contact with adjacent parts may have to be avoided.
The software program also permits drive information to be extracted so that compressive forces for static seals, and friction forces for dynamic seals could be accurately predicted to help customers within the last design of their products.
How do we use FEA?
Starting with a 2D or 3D mannequin of the preliminary design concept, we apply the boundary circumstances and constraints provided by a buyer; these can embody pressure, pressure, temperatures, and any utilized displacements. A appropriate finite element mesh is overlaid onto the seal design. This ensures that the areas of most curiosity return accurate outcomes. We can use larger mesh sizes in areas with much less relevance (or lower ranges of displacement) to minimise the computing time required to resolve the model.
Material properties are then assigned to the seal and hardware components. Most sealing supplies are non-linear; the quantity they deflect underneath a rise in force varies relying on how giant that force is. This is in contrast to the straight-line relationship for most metals and inflexible plastics. This complicates the fabric mannequin and extends the processing time, but we use in-house tensile take a look at amenities to precisely produce the stress-strain materials fashions for our compounds to make sure the analysis is as representative of real-world performance as potential.
What occurs with the FEA data?
ส่วนประกอบpressuregauge can take minutes or hours, depending on the complexity of the half and the range of working circumstances being modelled. Behind the scenes within the software program, many lots of of 1000’s of differential equations are being solved.
The outcomes are analysed by our skilled seal designers to identify areas where the design may be optimised to match the particular requirements of the applying. Examples of these necessities might embody sealing at very low temperatures, a must minimise friction ranges with a dynamic seal or the seal may need to face up to excessive pressures with out extruding; no matter sealing system properties are most essential to the client and the appliance.
Results for the finalised proposal may be introduced to the customer as force/temperature/stress/time dashboards, numerical knowledge and animations exhibiting how a seal performs all through the evaluation. This data can be utilized as validation information within the customer’s system design course of.
An example of FEA
Faced with very tight packaging constraints, this buyer requested a diaphragm element for a valve software. By utilizing FEA, we were capable of optimise the design; not only of the elastomer diaphragm itself, but also to suggest modifications to the hardware components that interfaced with it to extend the obtainable area for the diaphragm. This saved material stress ranges low to take away any possibility of fatigue failure of the diaphragm over the lifetime of the valve.
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