Once the price is presented, many foundry managers will reject the idea and never realize the benefits.
The cost of casting process simulation software may be shocking if one does not look past the sticker price. The primary roadblock to foundries adopting simulation tools is their perception that the software is too expensive. The accuracy of the results and the additional features that are available now were not even considered years ago. Result resolution has increased twentyfold. Project turnaround has been reduced from six weeks to six hours or less on standard computer equipment - and to a fraction of this time when using high-end computer hardware.
Computer hardware is not as expensive or as large as a semi-truck anymore. Simulation appeared to be expensive, it took a long time to calculate data, and the results showed almost nothing that was useful.Ī lot has changed since then, especially in today’s world of casting process simulation and autonomous optimization. At that time, simulation required expensive investments for both the software and the computer hardware to run it, the latter of which sometimes cost more than the software. In the more than 20 years since solidification simulation software has been available to metalcasting operations it has grown from a “nice-tohave” showpiece to a “need-to-have” engineering tool. The latest generation of simulation software offers fast and accurate information on process details that were unimaginable 20 years ago.