FEA and Positional Representations

[JavaLodge]

Hello everyone.  Is there a way to do FEA on an assembly with more than one positional representation?  I have a guardrail that is supported by uprights in two possible configurations.  Will I have to create a separate assembly for each representation?  Thanks in advance.

I am running Windows 7 Professional and Inventor 2014 Professional.

[blair · Accepted solution]

You can have multi positions and multi FEA's. You will have to create the new FEA data for each new load case. No way that I know to copy loads and boundry conditition from one load case to another. Just activate your positional rep and switch to FEA and  create a new load case. You can't run multi load cases at the same time

[JavaLodge]

Thanks blair, I got it!

[swalton · Accepted solution]

You can right-click on the simulation node in the FEA browser and select "Copy SImulation" to get a copy of the initial simulation.  Then edit the simulation properties on the copy and go to the model state tab.  There you should find dropdowns for LOD, View Rep and Position Rep.  Set those as required for the new position rep. 

If you highlight several simulation nodes in the FEA browser and click the "Simulate" button, IV will run all the selected simulations, one after the other.

[blair]

Guess, I need to spend less time using Sim-Mech and more time with Inventors FEA. Thanks for the tip on copy.