The objective of the paper is a survey on new finite element (FE) software and application developments at Daimler-Benz since the Detroit Conference 1974 at which the authors gave a similar paper on developments at that time.
The organizational background in which FE analysis is taking place at Daimler-Benz is given: computation giving support to design and testing, decentralized computation groups, centralized computer hardware and software, FE systems NASTRAN and ESEM/TPS10 at Daimler-Benz, in-house and out-of-house software development, verification and efficiency tests.
New FE software and application developments at Daimler-Benz are surveyed, especially the system GROVER for geometrically non-linear problems (large displacements, small strains), the MSC/NASTRAN superelement capability, the hybrid (modal/direct) frequency response analysis of full car simulations and a remarkable mesh and data generator.
The application examples cover spring and axle systems under large displacements, the over/understeer characteristics of an off-road truck, the frequency spectrum of stress amplitudes in a bus resulting from riding and a turbine blade static and dynamic analysis.