We get hired for many different types of engineering projects. One type of engineering job is for certification. A client of ours needed an Engineer to certify that their machine met API 7K specification. That is the American Petroleum Institute’s specification for Drilling and Well Servicing Equipment.
You can see the heavy machinery in the 3D solid model assembly above. It is driven by two 650 horsepower motors to drive an oil and gas rig. This is the winch that makes everything work. It lifts and lowers oil drilling equipment, pipe, and tools. The gearbox is big enough to park an SUV inside! We analyzed both the housing and shafts.
You can see the full assembly in our model above. In such jobs we also produce a meshed FEA model, a displacement plot and a stress plot as part of complete deliverables and specifications.
The displacement shows how much the material will move under a specified load.
The stress plot would display the distribution of the stress within the material.
The various analyses and drawings help in the design process as well as help understand where the failure points or weak areas would tend to be under normal or stressed working conditions.
Complexity can create a lot of unknown variables, thus, modeling and analysis can help not only in the design process but certifications within industry standards.
Are there areas you have to meet specifications that modeling and analysis would help?