What's New

View new features for HyperWorks CFD 2020.1.

Altair HyperWorks CFD 2020.1 Release Notes

Highlights

  • Geometric model preparation improvements
  • Acusolve physics setup enhancements
  • New automation environment
  • New external solver mesh writer

New Features

AcuSolve physics setup
Algebraic Eulerian multiphase model
Capability to simulate the momentum exchange between a carrier field and a dispersed field. When simulating multiphase flows using the disperse multiphase model, the carrier field must be a fluid and the dispersed field can be of any medium.
Fan component
New capability to model a fan by specifying fan characteristic curves. You can define the type of fan, fan thickness, and fan characteristics parameters – axial, radial, tangential force parameters, or P-Q curve.
Species transport
New capability to simulate species transport. You can define diffusivity of species, species at inflow conditions, and species sources.
Nucleate boiling
New setup capability to set up single and multiphase nucleate boiling simulation.
New automation environment
Template manager
Tool to define rules and automate the process:
  1. Rule based logic for groups, geometric operations, and setup
  2. Run geometric operations, meshing, and solver setup
Useful for:
  1. Automating the process – since templates are defined based on rules, the same can be applied to other models which have the same attributes as defined in the template rules
  2. Defining best practices for meshing and solver parameters and passing it to others
  3. Parametric studies
New external solver mesh writer
OpenFoam, CGNS, Fluent file support
Added support to write out surface and volume mesh for OpenFoam, CGNS, and Fluent. You can follow the same process as for AcuSolve setup and set all domain and boundaries. Based on the assigned materials and boundaries, mesh zones will be exported appropriately.

Enhancements

Geometric model preparation improvements
Improved geometric boolean robustness
Within the Boolean tools, you now have an option called Use Parasolid. If enabled, it calls Parasolid kernel for performing operations. It makes boolean operations significantly more robust for complex geometries.
Improved graphics performance improvement
Significant improvements have been made on large model visibility operations and selections. User will see 30-50% reduced time on operations such as:
  1. Selecting / deselecting geometries
  2. Showing/hiding/isolating geometries
  3. Switching transparency and color modes

Altair HyperWorks CFD 2020 Release Notes

Highlights

  • Improved geometry modeling
  • Enhanced AcuSolve physics modeling
  • Setup Browser capability
  • Legacy HyperMesh and AcuConsole files support
  • Integrated post-processing (beta)
  • Performance improvements
  • Misc enhancements and robustness improvements

Improved Geometric Modeling

New geometry repair workflow
New repair tools have been added in the Geometry ribbon. You can now check, interactively review, and fix surface or solid related issues. More topology checks have been added to have a complete view of the model state.

You can make any of the checks active/inactive or isolate any of the failing surfaces/solids. The checks are updated automatically on any changes to see the real time state of the displayed solids/surfaces.

New wrapping workflow
New wrapping workflow to create a watertight mesh model out of a huge number of parts. With new organization and tools, you can convert the geometry model to an FE model –> Cap the openings automatically –> Define local or proximity-based wrap controls –> Wrap the model –> Remesh the wrapped results –> Fix quality using auto-quality fix or manual editing.


Figure 1.
Auto-fix tool for FE geometry models
A new tool has been added to automatically fix errors in FE models. You can automatically fix degenerated elements, duplicate elements, higher aspect ratio elements, and intersections within the selection. It is a very powerful utility to automatically fix many errors without any manual work.
Interactive mesh editing tools
A new tool set has been added to review bad quality elements, sharp edge elements, and intersecting elements, and fix them using multiple available tools, such as by smoothing elements, by moving nodes, by splitting or swapping edges, by replacing nodes, or by creating/deleting elements. A model tour allows you to scroll through different patches of issue areas.
New right-click context menu
New right-click context menus have been added to find specific sets of surfaces/solids and to edit selected surfaces/solids. These menus will help you quickly interrogate a model and edit it using just right-clicks.

Enhanced AcuSolve Physics Modeling

Multiphase modeling
New tools to set up immiscible 2 phase flow simulations. You can now set up sloshing, filling, and draining transient simulations using the level set method. You have the capability to define the physics, phase definition, incoming fluid, and initial condition.


Figure 2.
Humidity modeling
New capability to model humidity. You can define relative humidity or a dew point condition at inlets and in initial conditions. This is useful for simulating humid air transport on a cabin model.




Figure 3.
Participating media radiation modeling
Capability to define participating media models and specular, diffuse, and partially specular interfaces. This is useful for simulating heat transfer analysis, such as a headlamp.
Heat exchanger component modeling
New tool to model heat exchangers using heat exchanger dimensions, coolant properties, friction properties, and effectiveness. An in-built plotting capability helps you to input axial velocity plots.
Atmospheric boundary layer modeling
A new tool to define atmospheric boundary layers using ground roughness, ground height, ground normal, and reference velocity. With this tool, you can model flow around buildings.


Figure 4.
External structural or rigid body code coupling
New tool to set up external rigid body or structural code coupling with AcuSolve. You can also set up the surface through which forces and deformation information will be transferred across solvers.
Momentum source
New tool to define a momentum source in the model locally. Useful for sloshing, filling, or draining simulations.
Nodal probing
New tool to interactively place monitor or prob points for the simulation. Useful to compare experimental probe data with simulation data. You can define a single node, group of nodes, or nodes on a line. The solver will write out time history output on these points.

Setup Browser

  • New browser to review groups, flow, radiation, motion, mesh controls, and monitors
  • Right-click menus enable you to create, edit, and control the visibility of entities.
  • Helps to review the overall setup of the model

Legacy HyperMesh and AcuConsole Files Support

  • In step towards supporting legacy files, you can now open files created in AcuConsole and the HyperMesh-CFD profile.
  • Geometry of the model, available physics setup, domain properties, and boundary conditions will be mapped in HyperWorks CFD.

Noted Performance Improvements

  • Significant improvement in geometry checks for large FE and CAD models
  • Much faster periodic meshing, mapping, and checks
  • FE geometry update performance improvements for geometric operations
  • Surface mesh checks speed up during volume meshing for large surface element models

Miscellaneous Enhancements and Robustness Improvements

  • Surface meshing robustness improvements for sharp edges
  • Better mesh failure handling
  • Directional selection for guide surface
  • Updates in periodic boundary conditions
  • Better hydrostatic pressure point definition