Simple Thermal Heat Transfer Finite Element Analysis in Excel 2007
Posted: April 1st, 2010 | Author: Tom Scarince | Filed under: Energy | No Comments »
While some free finite element analysis software is available, the engineer or student can learn a lot about how FEA works by constructing a simple model from scratch in a commonly available spreadsheet program such as Excel. The technique presented here can simulate a two dimensional flat plate of uniform thickness. Each boundary element can be an arbitrary fixed-temperature or insulated. The resultant temperature of each active element is iteratively calculated by simply averaging the temperatures of the adjacent cells. Read the rest of this entry »