Ansys SpaceClaim vs. SketchUp

I will highly recommend Ansys SpaceClaim, or in fact any Ansys to my colleague because of its wide spread acceptability around the globe and around the different industries. Thus, the results provided by Ansys simulation tools, given the proper boundary conditions are properly simulated, are highly reliable. Also, learning to utilize Ansys tools in the engineering design activities also helps in career advancements.

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SketchUp is great for individually studying options for building design. It is an awesome conceptual tool to be able to quickly model and manipulate a building to study different designs. It is not good for complex geometries, especially curves. Surfaces have a hard time registering and cutting into one another. It also eventually needs to go into Revit to be more realistic as it is not good as a documentation tool

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• It efficiently divide/split the surface into multiple fragments as per the user's requirements which helps in easy application of loads and boundary conditions.
• It helps in reducing the model complexity with it's efficient defeaturing options in order to reduce the model complexity.
• It also helps in making quick model changes as per the simulation results in order to improve the design and thus helps in quick FEA of the improvised design.

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• Quickly exploring solutions in 3D: We get a lot of "what if" and "what would that look like" questions. While hand-sketching and hand-drafting can be fairly quick, SketchUp allows me to quickly create 3D and 2D views of a detail or solution, change dimensions and materials in a flash, and show a client or installer the plan in minutes.
• Creating professional design documents in LayOut: Projects of any scale need good documentation. Using a combination of SketchUp and LayOut, I can create a Design Intent Set, plans for permitting, a set for mechanical trades to mark-up, etc. Having clear, appropriately-scaled drawings with dimensions or notations is a must, and we don't always have the time or budget to get an architect involved!
• Using live files to guide discussions: Not all clients are "visual" people, so opening their model and orbiting around their space in real time has been extremely helpful. Clients and trades enjoy the perspective views so much that we often include them in the full-sized drawing sets to give a good "overall" view of the project intent. For complex or tight spaces, sometimes un-rendered plans and elevations just aren't enough!

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• With time, Ansys SpaceClaim has evolved so much in its functionality and Ansys has added so many useful and complex features into it, but most of the team member are not aware about those features.
• For the newly added features and improvement in legacy features, Ansys can try adding training videos to better aware the engineers about their evolving features.
• Apart from that, I don't find anything disadvantageous about SpaceClaim.

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• Ability to import Revit files and libraries.
• Ability to export true curved vector linework. There are some workarounds, needs to be refined.
• Create an OPEN MAPS connection. Since the split from Google, the source for high-quality aerials is limited.
• Ability to dock all menus to the master window on a Mac
• Ability to develop dockable menu trays on a Mac

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We typically wait a few years in between renewing, as even older versions are powerful tools for modeling, and we make sure the amount of feature changes are worth the re-investment.

As a Mechanical Design Engineer working in and designing heavy structures for battery packs and chargers, I use Ansys SpaceClaim, day in and day out regularly as whenever the design team forwards the CAD model to FEA team, FEA team optimizes the model in SpaceClaim only, and to do so, design team also helps them in Ansys SpaceClaim

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It is very user friendly and easy to learn. It's simplicity allows for a low learning curve so more people can learn it faster. The downside is that most schools are no longer teaching it, so many younger professionals come out of school not knowing it and knowing more complex software and they have a hard time "dumbing down" their skillsets

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Sketchup is so intuitive; I can't recall ever looking for official support. However, there are many user forums online that can answer more questions. The usefulness of the online forums is, however, tempered by the fact that there have been many versions of the software under different ownership and support regimes, and thus finding the right information for the right version of the software can be a challenge.

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For the FEA analysis, PTC Creo, which is a CAD modelling software has inbuilt FEA simulation tool called as Creo Simulate which we generally use a very quick FEA on smaller parts. But when the geometry is very complex and we need to simplify it before the simulation, then we use Ansys SpaceClaim to simplify the model and then use Ansys Mechanical for structural simulation.

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We have not evaluated any other competing software to this one. I heard about this software from a friend who teaches how to use it. She showed me in just a few minutes and I was HOOKED. I saw immediately the possible help it would be to my business. Thank you.

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• Ansys SpaceClaim helps in easy modelling different types of design and different iterations of design which in turns helps in designing a cost effective products thereby saving a lot of material and production cost.
• Because of the easiness in modelling, changing and modifying the design and then running the simulation over it, the design team is able to test and every concept, which I turn helps in producing an efficient and cost effective design.

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• It's good in the sense that you can quickly make a drawing and speeds up the design process. Not sure how to quantify that from a ROI perspective.
• Also, good for editing an image after the fact. We can easily add a dimension that was forgotten in the original image.
• Allows team members to understand a design easier than on other software platforms.

Incentivized

Independently Invited by TrustRadius

A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info