Finite-element (FE) model creation is consistently a bottleneck in the process of getting from design concept to analysis results. Model meshing, tracking model files and keeping up with geometry changes are everyday challenges for FE analysts. Because FE pre-processing can be very time-consuming, John Deere currently outsources a majority of this work to a sister unit in India. In an attempt to automate the FE pre-processing effort, a pilot program using Altair Data Manager and Altair BatchMesher was initiated at the John Deere Southeast Engineering Center in Charlotte, N.C., to determine the viability of this solution.