Software independence: impact on automotive product development process

Purpose: Currently, in automotive industries one of the most important works in product design is the evaluation of crash events using FEM simulation; in this context, software independence, that means to obtain the same simulation results on the same vehicle-model using different FEM solvers, will be useful for reducing virtual prototyping time and consequently Time To Market. Design/methodology/approach: The carrying out of a software-independence translation methodology is the aim of this work, which is an input data translation by a methodology independent of the CAE calculation environment and allows reducing significantly the product development time. This methodology will be developed by routines written ad hoc in Matlab language, that carries back in LS-DYNA environment the cards written in RADIOSS environment, supported by TextPad editor and completed by pre-processor Hypermesh. Findings: The translation could be made using the pre and post-processor Hypermesh and the RADIOSS model card manual correction, but this way working increases greatly the Time To Market, although today it is the only procedure used in the most important Italian automotive industries. Research limitations/implications: Most of crash simulation models are carried out in RADIOSS environment, but the LS-DYNA environment potentialities exploration has increased the simulations demand using LSDYNA software; therefore the development of a translation methodology like that satisfies this requirement. Practical implications: Software independence in Virtual Prototyping could accelerate several processes, bringing many benefits such as the reduction in product development time and in real prototyping costs and the increase in quality, carrying out more competitive product on the market. Originality/value: The carrying out of a translation methodology, that allows to carry back in a software environment the Know How developed for another software environment, will provide considerable industrial advantages for vehicle designers (We’ve to remind that often many design tasks of a project are made in outsourcing way).