Siemens Digital Industries Software has announced the latest updates to NX™ software, the flagship product engineering solution from the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio. Siemens’ NX is the chosen design, engineering and manufacturing solution for a wide cross section of industry, from household names in aerospace, automotive and consumer products to the next generation of start-ups.

“With their latest updates and enhancements provided in the continuous release approach of NX, Siemens has heightened their focus on sustainability,” Dr. Ken Versprille, Executive Consultant, CIMdata. “The complete workflow that allows a manufacturer to not only tackle the challenges of product complexity and optimization but do so with a new set of intelligent sustainability focused tools that will assist manufacturers in meeting not only their functionality requirements, but also assist in reducing environmental impact.”

Sustainability impact analysis at the heart of design

Sustainability is a key focus across every industry, driven by consumer demand, corporate goals or governmental mandates and the need to ensure that a product’s environmental impact needs to not only be considered but optimized at the point of design – particularly when you consider that it’s estimated that over 80% of all product-related environmental impacts are determined during the product design phase.

The new Sustainability Impact Analysis capability delivered in NX puts environmental impact assessment front and center of a product’s development workflow. This is the first time that a product engineering solution has delivered EN15804-based sustainability metrics based on accurate 3D design data combined with an artificial intelligence driven material recommendation engine. It allows organizations to calculate, evaluate and optimize the impact of design decisions and material selection based on a diverse and comprehensive set of 30+ environmental impacts combined with a complete 3D design integrated sustainability reporting.

The integrated nature of the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio means that the same data is available for further reuse downstream and when connected to the wider enterprise. Environmental targets and requirements for design can then be driven from requirements captured in Siemens’ Teamcenter® software for product lifecycle management and used for validation against requirements and environmental credits.

Enabling a true left shift for simulation

With the ever-increasing pressure on design teams to deliver smarter, more sophisticated products, compounded by growing system complexity and reduction in resources allocated to design, the idea of simulation during the design process to help validate product concepts is gaining traction. At the same time, simulation is still perceived as a complex process, requiring an expert to drive it.

To help bring the power of simulation to the very front of the design process, Siemens is introducing the Performance Predictor capability to NX that leverages the power of modern graphics processing unit (GPU) hardware to deliver near real-time simulation results directly within their workhorse design tool. After applying boundary and loading conditions and materials, parts can be simulated in real time, with results overlaid directly on the 3D model, meaning that NX’s industry leading geometry editing tools can be used concurrently to edit, simulate and refine a design in real time.

The same technology can used to deliver parametrically driven studies using the Design Space Explorer in NX to define and solve multi-parameter, goal-based optimization studies in a fraction of the time traditionally associated with such activities. Additionally, once defined, this simulation data can be reused and built on in the Simcenter™ software products for more advanced simulation as the project progresses.

Accelerating molded part design

The need for molded parts continues to increase at a rapid rate with the market expected to grow from $520B in 2020 to $750B by 2028 and manufacturers are looking for ways to reduce design iterations, remove costly physical prototypes and eliminate trial-and-error workflows common in molded part design.

The Molded Part Designer capability now delivered in NX provides designers with the ability to create, manage and validate their molded part design features (such as bosses, stand-offs, snap clips, lips/grooves) in the context of their 3D design data within the native NX environment. Whether developed from best practices as a Feature Template or imported from a 3rd party supplier, NX Molded Part Designer will validate these features, perform a moldability analysis and present the results in visual dashboards where design feasibility and design options can be evaluated in the context of multiple scenarios, such as moldability, structural analysis and more.

Material considerations can also be considered, which is especially helpful when used in conjunction with the Sustainability Impact Analysis capabilities in NX to ensure that the material not only meets the functional and manufacturability requirements, but also satisfies environmental requirements.

Bringing tool management to the cloud

Standardization of tooling used in CNC manufacturing operations not only provides companies with reduced tooling costs, but it can also enhance the sharing of best practice amongst distributed manufacturing teams. The new Cloud Tool Manager delivered in the NX CAM capabilities uses modern web-based technology to easily centralize and manage tools and holders across an organization. It also supports the import of tool data directly from tool vendors’ catalogs, minimizing manual input, accelerating NC programming, and enabling manufacturers to take advantage of the latest tooling advances to handle increasing part complexity, tighter tolerances and new materials.