FEA is becoming a necessary tool for marine structure design, but there are some shortcomings in its application. In this paper, we introduce the concept of knowledge engineering on the basis of parametric modeling, character modeling and object-oriented technology, and present a method of highly-efficient FEA modeling for complicated marine structure. The approach deals with not only rapid modeling but also the connection between FEA model and real structure, which means the area need strengthening can be quickly located directly from FEA results. A prototype system was built based on VB, ANSYS and AutoCAD to demonstrate and confirm the validity of the concept.
Finite element analysis (FEA) is a powerful tool for the analysis of various types of structures and plays an important role in marine structure design. With the compel implementation of common structure rule, FEA has become an indispensable step of ship structure design. However, there are still some shortcomings of FEA application, especially in the modeling phase. In a whole FEA progress, the modeling time will take 40~50%, which means that the modeling efficiency direct make an effect on the whole analysis efficiency. From the knowledge engineering perspective, every action of FEA data processing in each phase is actually the decision that the designer made after he did some reasoning by major knowledge, experience and regulation. Integrating knowledge with tools will greatly increase the efficiency of design and analysis. In this paper, the authors introduce the concept of knowledge engineering, form the knowledge base of marine structure design and a hybrid reasoning mechanism of RBR and CBR and establish the system architecture of KE-based marine structure FEA, aiming at the improvement of marine structure FEA efficiency.
