DE Roundtable: Shedding Excess Weight from Products

Panelists for DE's upcoming roundtable discussion on lightweighting (left to right): Keith Meintjes, CIMdata; Alan Taub, LIFT; and Andreas Vlahinos, Advanced Engineering Solutions

It's new year, so many of you may be hitting the gym, trying to shed some of the pounds added to the waistline during the holiday feasts.

But among designers and engineers, another kind of weight loss program is becoming the norm. I'm talking about lightweighting -- designing smaller, lighter products using topology optimization software.

Prompted by stricter CAFÉ standards and consumer preference for fuel efficiency, car makers began using different strategies for lightweighting.  The centerpiece to this approach is the use of sophisticated software programs to identify where to remove materials.

Next Thursday January 21, join me and my panelists in our interactive chat covering:

• the move from simulation to optimization
• problems and issues associated with software-proposed designs
• the current technology stack in the market for topology optimization
• opportunities presented by additive manufacturing with metal and composite
• setting realistic goals for what's achievable in lightweighting
• and more.

• Keith Meintjes, Practice Manager, Simulation and Analysis, CIMdata
• Andreas Vlahinos, Principal, Advanced Engineering Solutions
• Alan Taub, Chief Technology Officer, LIFT

To register, go to the event registration page here.