If you’re a fan of head-to-head comparisons of CFD codes, this week’s CFD news includes Resolved Analytics’ look at Fluent vs. STAR-CCM+. And if you’re a fan of hard-hitting comparisons of CAD software, you’ll find a look at SolidWorks vs. Onshape. And if you prefer reading about CFD results, there are plenty of applications this week including the aerodynamics of a cyclists shown here from the paper by Blocken et al.

Reading and Event

• In Part 4 of their series of articles comparing CFD software the folks at Resolved Analytics take a look at ANSYS Fluent and Siemens STAR-CCM+.
  • Note to our friends at Resolved Analytics: The section on STAR-CCM+’s post-processing capabilities makes a comparison to “the capabilities of the leading stand-alone visualization packages such as Pointwise.” I can only speculate that you meant to write either Tecplot or FieldView because Pointwise is a stand-alone meshing package. Thank you to alert reader Darrin for making me aware of this error.
  • I would love to hear some comments from our friends at ANSYS and Siemens.
• PTC’s LiveWorx 2020 will be held in Boston on 8-11 June. The call for papers is open with a due date of 19 September.

Pointwise and Events

• 02-04 October: Carolyn Woeber will be presenting at Tetrahedron VI meshing conference.
• 14-17 October: We are sponsoring will be attending (and hopefully presenting) at the 28th International Meshing Roundtable.
• 28-29 October: We are sponsoring and exhibiting at the 35th International CAE Conference.
• 12 November: We are hosting a workshop on Pointwise for Marine.
• 14 November: We are hosting a workshop on Pointwise for Automotive.

CFD for…

• litter transport in Loch Long.
• understanding cricket. [Can anything help me understand cricket?]
• sprinting cyclists.
• motorcycle helmets.
• marine aerodynamics.
• indoor thermal environments.

Chocolate Fluid Dynamics. Screen capture from a Matar Fluids Group simulation of a chocolate fountain. [One of the nastiest things you’ll find in any restaurant. They should’ve include in the simulation some kid’s arm stuck into the flow.]

News

• The Airbus XRF1 is an “industrial standard multi-disciplinary research test case representing a typical configuration for a long range wide body aircraft. It is used by Airbus to engage with external partners on development and demonstration of relevant capabilities / technologies” for which Airbus will be holding two invitation only workshops on and 26 November.
• If you like software reviews written by someone who’s not afraid to voice strong opinions, check out The (CAD) World After SolidWorks.
• Calling it as close to thrilling as an earnings report can be, Monica Schnitger shared ANSYS‘ 2019 Q2 results. Some highlights:
  • $369 million gross revenue, up 21%
  • One single deal accounted for $49 million.
  • ANSYS is seeing a shift in their customers’ preferences from perpetual (i.e. paid-up) licenses to annual (leased) licenses.

MSC Apex includes an enhanced toolset for creating geometry from NASTRAN meshes.

Software

• CFD Direct launched version 7.0 of  [the anagram acronym] CFDDFC consisting of OpenFOAM, ParaView, OpenMPI, and FreeCAD running on AWS.
• C3D Toolkit 2019 was released.
• The 1st Automotive CFD Prediction Workshop will be held at the University of Oxford on 11-12 December. Abstracts are due 09 September.
• Read about how Altair’s ultraFluidX can run high-fidelity simulations overnight on GPUs.

The Line Between Representation and Abstraction

When does a painting cross the line from representation to abstraction? Jason Anderson’s landscapes seem to make that distinction irrelevant. His use of quad facets of varying size, orientation, and color dovetails wonderfully with representations of cityscapes backlit by the setting (or rising) sun. As first seen on Colossal, you can see and read more about the artist on his website.

Jason Anderson, Ternary, 2019. Image from jasonandersonartist.co.uk. See links above.

Bonus: A bit late for the 50th anniversary of the lunar landing but here’s a PDF of NASA SP-4104, NASA Engineers and the Age of Apollo.