COSMOSXpress

COSMOSXpress offers an easy-to-use first pass stress analysis tool for SolidWorks users. COSMOSXpress can help you reduce cost and time-to-market by testing your designs on the computer instead of expensive and time-consuming field tests.
For example, you may want to examine the effects of a force applied to the faucet. COSMOSXpress simulates the design cycle and provides stress results. It also shows critical areas and safety levels at various regions in the faucet. Based on these results, you can strengthen unsafe regions and remove material from overdesigned areas.
Critical regions
Deformed shape
COSMOSXpress uses the same design analysis technology that COSMOSWorks uses to perform stress analysis. More advanced analysis capabilities are available within the COSMOSWorks line of products. The wizard interface of COSMOSXpress guides you through a five step process to specify material, restraints, loads, run the analysis, and view the results.
The accuracy of the results of the analysis depend on material properties, restraints, and loads. For results to be valid, the specified material properties must accurately represent the part material, and the restraints and loads must accurately represent the part working conditions.
COSMOSXpress supports the analysis of solid, single-bodied parts only. It does not support the analysis of assemblies, surface models, or multibody parts.
After building your design in SolidWorks, you may need to answer questions like:
Will the part break?
How will it deform?
Can I use less material without affecting performance?
In the absence of analysis tools, these questions can only be answered by performing expensive and time-consuming product development cycles. A product development cycle typically includes the following steps:
Build your model in the SolidWorks CAD system.
Prototype the design.
Test the prototype in the field.
Evaluate the results of the field tests.

Modify the design based on the field test results.
This process continues until a satisfactory solution is reached. Analysis can help you accomplish the following tasks:
Reduce cost by testing your model using the computer instead of expensive field tests.
Reduce time to market by reducing the number of product development cycles.
Optimize your designs by quickly simulating many concepts and scenarios before making a final decision, giving you more time to think of new designs.
Stress Analysis
Stress or static analysis calculates the displacements, strains, and stresses in a part based on material, restraints, and loads. A material fails when the stress reaches a certain level. Different materials fail at different stress levels. COSMOSXpress uses linear static analysis, based on the Finite Element Method, to calculate stresses. Linear static analysis makes several assumptions to calculate stresses in the part.
Finite Element Method
The Finite Element Method (FEM) is a reliable numerical technique for analyzing engineering designs. FEM replaces a complex problem with many simple problems. It divides the model into many small pieces of simple shapes called elements.
CAD model of a bracket
Model subdivided into small pieces (elements)
Elements share common points called nodes. The behavior of these elements is well-known under all possible support and load scenarios. The motion of each node is fully described by translations in the X, Y, and Z directions. These are called degrees of freedom (DOFs). Analysis using FEM is called Finite Element Analysis (FEA).
A tetrahedral element. Red dots represent the element's nodes. Element edges can be curved or straight
COSMOSXpress formulates the equations governing the behavior of each element taking into consideration its connectivity to other elements. These equations relate the displacements to known material properties, restraints, and loads.
Next, the program organizes the equations into a large set of simultaneous algebraic equations. The solver finds the displacements in the X, Y, and Z directions at each node.
Using the displacements, the program calculates the strains in various directions. Finally, the program uses mathematical expressions to calculate stresses.
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