Announcing Romax 2022: an all-new modelling environment and new opportunities to link Romax with Adams and QUINDOS
Hexagon are excited to announce the 2022 release of the Romax software suite, which sees new features and improvements across the product portfolio.
The 2D modelling capability which our Concept customers have loved for years has been brought into the main Romax application, so it can be used to build and edit models in Enduro, Spectrum, Energy and Spin, as well as Evolve. This new system-level worksheet features drag-and-drop tools that allow intuitive, fast modelling which is easy-to-use, even for beginners and non-experts. Of course, you may have started a design in Concept anyway and then transfer your model to other Romax products. Or you might want to bring model geometry from CAD into Romax. Either way, once within the Romax application, you can edit the model quickly and easily with the 2D modeler, but you can also build from scratch much more quickly than before too.
Also aiming to improve processes and increase collaboration and democratization, our new workflow with Adams will enable transmission and ePowertrain models to be easily created in Romax and then transferred to Adams to be included in system-level simulations. It also means the same ePowertrain model can be used for static and steady-state dynamic analysis (Romax) and transient, non-linear analysis (Adams). Romax and Adams technologies are united within the System Dynamics team at Hexagon, and we are working together to provide new solutions to the problems that our joint customers face and to improve their experience of our technologies. This workflow is the first step on our journey in this direction.
In our 2021 release, we announced a workflow with JMAG-Express, a cloud-based, free-to-use tool for the rapid sizing and evaluation of electric machines. In our 2022 release, a new development allows users to open the tool from within the Romax environment, generate an electric machine design, and import the machine geometry directly into the Romax model as part of an early stage structural analysis – all within minutes.
Moving from workflows with our new partner tools to the expertise on which Romax was founded, the 2022 release sees new, advanced bearing capability. Bearings operating under high speeds and low loads are prone to a dynamic phenomenon known as bearing skidding – this is the gross sliding of rolling elements on raceways. This occurs when the tractive forces between rolling elements and raceways are not enough to overcome drag and inertial forces. Skidding in certain circumstances is known to cause excessive frictional heat generation and high surface shear stress. This can lead to bearing failure, long before classical fatigue failure. Prediction of this behaviour in rolling-element bearings is a challenging task because it depends on a number of parameters such as internal load distribution, lubricant properties, temperatures and internal clearances. Also, skidding is a transient dynamic phenomenon and therefore cannot be predicted using quasi-static models. As part of Romax 2022, we have re-launched our Bearing Dynamics capability as a desktop application, for analysis of failure modes not considered by the standard methods, with an updated UI and support for new bearing types.
Increasingly, industry trends and pressures are pushing engineers to consider design and manufacturing simultaneously, or at least to consider one’s impact on the other. Cylindrical gear tooth flank measurement data can now be imported using the Gear Data Exchange (GDE) open format. The gears with this data applied can then be analysed as usual using micro-geometry and GBTE analysis to evaluate tooth contact results such as load distribution, transmission error, contact stress, etc. This allows a Romax model to be utilised as a digital twin of a system and sub-system, augmenting the insight that gear measurement can provide using the traditional geometrical tolerances-based approach that treats the gear in isolation. The measured data can also be compared to the designed and virtually-manufactured forms using the comparison tools in Romax software. It is also possible to export the macro- and micro-geometry parameters of detailed cylindrical gears in the Gear Data Exchange (GDE) open format as specified in the standard VDI/VDE 2610. This allows other software that supports this format to easily import such data from Romax software, eliminating or minimising manual data entry and therefore saving time and reducing the possibilities for human error.
In addition to these major new features, the Romax 2022 release includes a multitude of other features and enhancements, driven by key market trends and customer needs, including equivalent radiated power, parametric study and batch running improvements, support for ISO 6336-20/21:2017 gear scuffing calculations, reporting of bearing passing frequencies and orders, inclusion of injection lubrication in gear mesh loss calculations, and more.
Existing customers can find out more by going to our Support Portal and watching our on-demand webinar. If you do not have an existing support agreement but are interested in these new features, please get in touch with us today.