IMAGE ACOUSTICS, INC.
FEAT – Finite Elemental Analysis of a Tonpilz Transducer
FEAT is a FEA program
that creates, controls, and analyzes a 3D Tonpilz transducer. No FEA experience is necessary as the program
is designed to be very user-friendly. The
entire program is managed in 1 MATLAB GUI. This 1 window allows the user to
quickly and easily control the program. Inputs
include dropdown boxes listing numerous material options for the piezoelectric
ring, glue holding them together, piston, tie rod, a tail mass, head shank, and
tail shank. All of these mechanical
components can be set to “other” for custom materials not listed. Appropriate dimensions are clearly presented
for adjustment. The model can be
subjected to rho-c loading, a rigid baffle, a free field, and in a vacuum for
testing. Prior to running the model through ANSYS, MATLAB will provide a 2d
axisymmetric sketch of the design. When
prompted by the user, MATLAB tells ANSYS to perform the analysis via batch
mode. Batch mode allows for greater
efficiency and the user does not have to interface with ANSYS at all. When ANSYS is complete, an excel spreadsheet
of the results is created which MATLAB reads to bring the results to the
GUI. Plots are also created and an image
of the FEA model is available to view in MATLAB.
FEAT comes with 1 MATLAB file and a text file for
assistance. Only 1 MATLAB file is
required to run the program. All other
files are generated automatically as needed by FEAT. Thus, they can be deleted
at any time. Furthermore, a save and
load feature is in place to quickly describe inputs and outputs. This model is axisymmetric in nature for fast
analysis. By default, inputs are set up
so the program can run on ANSYS ED. For
larger element sizes, the full version of ANSYS is required. Support and updates will be instituted as
necessary.
System Requirements:
Windows Operating System, MATLAB 2007 or greater,
Microsoft Excel, ANSYS and/or ANSYS ED.
Figure 1: FEAT Interface
Figure 2: ANSYS FEA model displayed in MATLAB interface
Figure 3: MATLAB sketch of transducer