The majority of the company’s business, roughly 70 percent, involves engineering consulting, requiring the firm to use a variety of 3D design tools to support the needs of its customers. These include the SolidWorks®, Pro/ENGINEER®, and Autodesk Inventor® 3D CAD systems. However, after using SolidWorks software on a few projects, Diversified Product Development made the decision to standardize on SolidWorks as its preferred design package, according to Vice-President of Engineering Marvin Franklin.
We had used Pro/MECHANICA® for our analysis work, but you have to be quite the magician to use it. Growing the analysis portion of our business was an important goal for us, so we decided to evaluate SolidWorks Simulation. Based on our experience with SolidWorks CAD software, we knew that the user-friendliness would be there and decided to see how
it would perform in our consulting practice, which involves primarily structural stress and deflection analysis.”
Diversified Product Development acquired two floating licenses of SolidWorks Simulation software because it’s easier to use, provides accurate results more quickly, and is completely integrated with SolidWorks CAD software. “We believed that SolidWorks Simulation could help us grow the analysis portion of our business,” Franklin recalls.
An easier approach to analysis
After implementing SolidWorks Simulation software, Diversified Product Development engineers became increasingly proficient with the software, obtaining analysis information more quickly and easily than with previous solutions. “Our guys became good at using SolidWorks Simulation pretty quickly,” Franklin points out. “We had a customer that was using an older FEA (finite element analysis) package and we decided to run a specific problem both ways. SolidWorks Simulation provided a solution in one-third of the time that it took to run in the other package.”
“It’s easier to mesh your model with SolidWorks Simulation,” notes Project Engineer Dale Wyble. “I can run diagnostics on the mesh to get help in refining the mesh, when necessary, and reach a solution with about one-third of the number of mouse clicks. We can do more analyses in a day with SolidWorks Simulation because it’s faster and easier to reach a solution.”
“The advantage of SolidWorks Simulation is that you don’t have to transfer information back and forth between applications,” adds Project Engineer Caleb Fulks. “SolidWorks Simulation provides a much more cost-effective means for conducting analysis.”
Faster solutions, shorter prototype cycles
Because Diversified Product Development can perform design verifications more quickly with SolidWorks Simulation, the software is helping the consultancy catch mistakes, reduce its prototype testing cycles, shorten development cycles, and bring products to market more quickly.
“We prototype about 60 percent of the development work that we do for other OEMs,” Franklin says. “We do actual testing with instruments like strain gauges on many projects for proof of design and to confirm areas that may impact a product’s lifecycle. Using SolidWorks Simulation, we have shortened these cycles by 10 to 15 percent, which is significant in terms of both time and costs.”
Better tools spark business growth
Since implementing SolidWorks Simulation software, Diversified Product Development
has tripled the amount of consulting revenue related to its analysis work. “While analysis represents a small part of our overall business, growing it is an important goal,” Franklin stresses. “Because our engineers can complete analysis projects more quickly, they can take on more work. Today, we’re doing three times as much FEA as we did two or three years ago and we’re getting jobs that involve just doing analysis.
“SolidWorks Simulation benefits both sides of our operation,” Franklin continues. “In manufacturing our own products, we have certain requirements that we have to meet.
The software helps us shorten design cycles for our in-house products while creating opportunities to do additional projects in our consulting work. SolidWorks Simulation is helping us to build up our product line and grow the analysis consulting part of our business as much as possible.”
To learn more about how SolidWorks and MLC CAD Systems helped Diversified Product Development increase productivity and decrease time to market contact us at (800) 364-1652, email us at
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or contact your local MLC CAD Systems representative for more information.
