Intelligent Light Uses Cloud for CFD Post-processing

Intelligent Light’s FieldView software for CFD post-processing includes cloud computing capabilities that allow massive datasets to be processed remotely with results displayed on an engineer’s desktop workstation.  Datasets exceeding 1 TB are impractical to download from a remote compute server for post-processing and this is where FieldView’s client-server capability comes into play according to this Desktop Engineering article.  Examples cited include wind turbine wake interference studies and the aerodynamics of racing bike wheels.

• CFD in the Cloud at Desktop Engineering
• Intelligent Light’s website

Mentor Graphics’ Mechanical U2U

Mentor Graphics announced the scheduled for their Mechanical U2U events, otherwise known as Mechanical Analysis User to User Forums.  These advanced training sessions for users of their CFD products FloEFD, FloTHERM, and FloVENT promise to be a forum for users to interact among themselves but also with Mentor Graphic’s product managers.  The North American Event will be held 20-21 October in Boston.

• Mentor Graphics’ blog post
• Mentor Graphics’ Mechanical Analysis website

Symscape Uses Cloud for CFD Solver

Symscape announced the July 2011 availability of their Caedium CFD solver that will use Windows HPC Server 2008 R2 and Windows Azure together to provide compute resources for large CFD problems.  After participating in a pilot “burst to Windows Azure” project, Symscape successfully tested the cloud for a CFD solution with 600,000 cells  (25 MB of data) and predicted that use of the cloud for 100,000,000 cells (4 GB of data) would be possible.

• Microsoft-Symscape Case Study
• Symscape’s website
• Symscape’s June 2011 newsletter

Desktop Engineering Questions Analysis in the Cloud

Desktop Engineering surveyed CAE providers and users about the status and future of cloud computing and received opinions that span from impractical to indispensable.  CFD provider CD-adapco seems to have a very mature cloud-based capability with their Power-on-Demand licensing options.  Other vendors cite issues with the security of storing simulation data remotely and the practicality of moving huge analysis datasets off the cloud and back onto the user’s computer.  One cynical user surveyed thinks cloud computing is just a way to get people to pay for subscriptions.   Read the article and judge for yourself.

• Cloud-based Analysis from Desktop Engineering
• CD-adapco’s website

Journal of CFD Case Studies

NAFEMS this month published the ninth volume of the Journal of CFD Case Studies including simulations of high temperature cyclones, automotive headlamps, gas turbine compressors, industrial paint dryers and more.

• International Journal of CFD Case Studies Vol. 9
• NAFEMS’ website

CFD Application Round-up

• Austal, the Australian-based manufacturer of aluminum fast ferries, uses CFD as part of their design process.
• HPCwire wrote about Reaction Design‘s work in combustion CFD.
• CFD simulations were part of a study that amended an ASHRAE standard for ventilation systems in health care facilities.
• The YuuZoo yacht racing team used CFD to optimize the lift produced by their ship’s underwater appendages.
• Finland’s Foreship used CFD to design a skeg for cruise ships that provides a 2% reduction in propulsion power required.