Simlab - Topology Optimization for Heat Transfer

Altair Forum User
Altair Forum User
Altair Employee
edited October 2020 in Community Q&A

Greetings,

 

i want to do a topology optimization for heat transfer with Simlab cause of my master thesis. To sum up my general content of my thesis: There should be a topology optimization of an electronic housing for better heat transfer to the ambient. The housing will be manufactured by additive methods (SLM).

 

First i am trying to build some simple models to test the general form of the results and to check my constraints.

For this i built a model, the topology optimization is already done (picture):

 

On the top plain is a heat flow given and on the lower plain a constant temperature. I used Optistruct with steady state heat flow, default material parameters/optimization parameters.

Objective function to minimize is the thermal complaince while keeping the mass fraction of the design area betweeen both top and bottom plains under a specific value (e.g 0.2). Design area has the shape of an pyramid with cutted top.

 

I want to generate structures which evenly transfer the heat from a small area(top) to a wide area (bottom). This result picture (opened with hyperview, last iteration and showing iso lines of the element density) shows that the aspect of reducing the mass working but the structure seems not to spread the heat evenly.

 

Which constraints i need to adjust to get the intended results? Two other questions: Is it not possible to generate a material with anisotropic heat conductive? And how to extract the generated topology as a stl, step or other file to load it into a CAD Software. At the end i need to put in these topologies into the housing.

 

Thanks for your help!

 

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