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Design Explorer
Multi-disciplinary design exploration and optimization tools.
Output Responses
An output response is a measurement of system performances, such as mass, volume, displacement, stress, strain, or reaction forces.
Create Mass and Volume Responses
Use the Mass/Volume tool to create mass or volume responses. The resulting response is the mass or volume of the entire model or the mass of an individual property or material.

Welcome
What's New
View new features for Altair HyperWorks 2024.
Get Started
Learn the basics and discover the workspace.
Tutorials
Learn more about the Altair HyperWorks suite of products with interactive tutorials.
Startup Procedures and Customizations
Start and configure the applications.
Tool Finder
View a list of deprecated panels and their newer, equivalent workflows.
Manage Files and Data
Create, open, import, and save models.
Sessions and Report Templates
Set up sessions and create report templates.
Interface with External Products
Solver interfaces supported in HyperMesh.
Entities and Solver Interfaces
A solver interface is made up of a template and a FE-input reader.
Browsers
Browsers provide a structured view of model data, which you can use to review, modify, create, and manage the contents of a model. In addition to visualization, browsers offer features like search, filtering, and sorting, which enhance your ability to navigate and interact with the model data.
Sketching
Create and edit 2D parametric sketch geometry.
Topology
Create, edit, and cleanup geometry.
FE Geometry
FE geometry is topology on top of mesh, meaning CAD and mesh exist as a single entity. The purpose of FE geometry is to add vertices, edges, surfaces, and solids on FE models which have no CAD geometry.
Meshing and Elements
Explore the different types of mesh you can create in HyperMesh and create and edit 0D, 1D, 2D, and 3D elements.
Model Build and Assembly
Create, organize and manage parts and subsystems.
Composites
HyperMesh composites modeling.
Connectors
Create connections between parts of your model.
Morph
Rapidly change the shape of the FE mesh without severely sacrificing the mesh quality.
Skeleton Modeling
Create a reduced ordered model to facilitate optimization at the concept phase.
Design Space
Workflow to support topology optimization model build and setup.
Optimization
Setup an Optimization in HyperMesh.
Design Explorer
Multi-disciplinary design exploration and optimization tools.
- Open the Design Explorer Browser
  The Design Explorer Browser displays a hierarchical view of your design setup and can be used to enable and disable exploration parameters.
- Explorations
  An exploration is a multi-run simulation. Each exploration includes input design variables, and output responses. Explorations may also include goals, consisting of one or more objectives and constraints.
- Input Design Variables
  An input design variable is a system parameter that influences the system performance in the chosen output response. Typical design variables may be a part's thickness, shape, or material property. Ranges, with lower and upper bounds, are specified and the variable's value will vary within the exploration. The terms input, input design variable, and design variable are used interchangeably.
- Output Responses
  An output response is a measurement of system performances, such as mass, volume, displacement, stress, strain, or reaction forces.
  - Create Mass and Volume Responses
    Use the Mass/Volume tool to create mass or volume responses. The resulting response is the mass or volume of the entire model or the mass of an individual property or material.
  - Create Displacement, Rotation, Velocity, and Acceleration Responses
    Use the Disps. tool to create displacement, rotation, velocity, or acceleration responses from selected nodes.
  - Create Stress and Strain Responses
    Use the Stress/Strain tool to create stress and strain responses for selected elements or properties.
  - Create Force Responses
    Use the Force tool to create force responses from 1D elements or constraints.
  - Create Frequency Responses
    Use the Frequency tool to create modal frequency responses. The resulting response is the frequency of the given mode number. In addition, a Modal Assurance Criteria (MAC) is created in the background and used to ensure that the desired mode is used in each run in the exploration.
  - Create Connector Responses
    Use the Connector tool to create connector responses. The resulting response is the number of realized connections in the entire model or in selected connectors.
  - Create Measure Responses
    Use the Measure tool to create responses for supported measurements.
  - Create Derived Responses
    Use the Derived tool to create responses which are combination of existing responses.
  - Create Generic Response
    Generic responses can be created two ways, by specifying a solver result file containing the desired response or by specifying a session file containing desired response evaluations.
- Objectives
  Objectives are metrics to be minimized or maximized in an optimization exploration. Minimizing mass to find a lightweight design is a common example.
- Constraints
  Constraints need to be satisfied for an optimization to be acceptable. Constraints may also be associated with a DOE. While not used in the evaluation of the DOE, constraints can be useful while visualizing DOE results. Limits on displacement or stress are common examples.
- Review and Edit Design Parameters
  Review the explorations, inputs, responses, and goals in your design setup.
- Evaluate
  Use the Evaluate tools to run the exploration and review reports.
Validate
Validate the model built before running solver analysis.
Analyze
Models require loads and boundary conditions in order to represent the various physics and/or physical equivalents to bench and in-use testing.
Axisymmetry
Reduce a full 3D model with axisymmetric surfaces while accounting for imperfections.
Concept Modeling
Tools and workflows that are dedicated to rapidly creating new parts for specific use cases, or amending existing parts. The current capabilities are focused on stiffening parts.
Crash and Safety
Tools used for crash and safety analysis.
Airbag
Use airbag folder utilities and export a resulting airbag in a Radioss deck.
Aerospace
Essential utility tools developed using HyperMesh-Tcl.
Aeroelasticity
Import an aeroelastic finite element model with Nastran Bulk Data format.
Certification
Framework to plug certification methods to assess margin of safety from the model and result information.
PhysicsAI
Use PhysicsAI to build fast predictive models from CAE data. PhysicsAI can be trained on data with any physics or remeshing and without design variables.
Results Data
Results data can be post-processed using both HyperMesh and HyperView.
Developer
The Developer ribbon contains tools for automation and customization.
Plot Data
HyperGraph is a data analysis and plotting tool with interfaces to many file formats.
Multibody Modeling
MotionView is a general pre-processor for Multibody Dynamics.
Media Files
MediaView plays video files, displays static images, tracks objects, and measures distances.
Tabulate Results
Use TableView to create an Excel-like spreadsheet.
Text Files
TextView math scripts reference vector data from HyperGraph windows to automate data processing and data summary.
Publishing and Reporting
Create, define, and export reports.
Collaboration Tools
Explore, organize and manage your personal data, collaborate in teams, and connect to other data sources, such as corporate PLM systems to access CAD data or publish simulation data.

Create Mass and Volume Responses

Use the Mass/Volume tool to create mass or volume responses. The resulting response is the mass or volume of the entire model or the mass of an individual property or material.

Restriction: Volume responses are only available for OptiStruct.

From the Design Explorer ribbon, click the Mass/Volume tool.

Figure 1.
Use the drop-down menu on the left side of the guide bar to select the response type.
Optional: Select a single property or material if using OptiStruct.

If no properties are selected, then the response will be the mass or volume of the entire model.
On the guide bar, click to create the response.