Courses:  Outline

Course Outline

Strand7 develops and presents courses in finite element analysis and the practical use of the Strand7 FEA system. The current suite of courses have been presented and refined over many years and have been attended by hundreds of engineers and designers, worldwide. See upcoming courses for information on scheduling a course.

We present two types of courses:
  1. Regular courses ranging from general introductory, to advanced, to specialised courses. These are summarised below.

  2. Customised courses, with emphasis on specific topics of interest. These can include topics from our suite of standard courses, or completely new topics developed specifically to address the user's requirements.
The following are our standard courses:
    Introducing Strand7
    Nonlinear Analysis
    Dynamic Analysis
    Structural Analysis
    Heat Transfer Analysis
    Automeshing
    API Development


Introducing Strand7: 16-32 hours
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This introductory course is intended for engineers with little or no previous experience in Strand7 or FEA. It is designed to give an overall understanding of the use of Strand7 in solving real engineering problems. It teaches how to create and verify finite element models, how to set up the solvers and interpret the results using the post-processing tools. The examples presented cover the use of beam, plate and brick elements and the most common solvers.

Some of the topics covered include:
  • Overview of Strand7 including pre and post processing.
  • Setting up the display, dynamic rotations and general configuration of Strand7.
  • Selecting entities.
  • Units.
  • Creating meshes and using grouping functions.
  • Creating load and freedom cases.
  • Using the property libraries and customising the content.
  • Model summary, including user defined information about model details, properties, bill of materials.
  • Solvers - linear static, natural frequency, spectral response, heat transfer.
  • Post-processing of results, including contouring, graphing, stress averaging and units.
  • Reporting of results, including printing, graphing, tabular listings and animations.
  • Advanced element attributes.
  • Link elements.
  • Cut and paste features.
  • User-defined beam sections and calculation of properties.
  • Introduction to CAD geometry and automeshing.

Nonlinear Analysis: 8 hours
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This course addresses the growing need to undertake nonlinear analysis in structural and mechanical design.

Some of the topics covered include:
  • Overview of geometric, material and boundary nonlinearity.
  • Large displacement analysis of frame and shell structures.
  • Elasto-plastic analysis of continuum models, including unloading and residual stress.
  • Nonlinear buckling and post-buckling using automatic load stepping.
  • Solver parameters and convergence.
  • Specialised nonlinear elements such as cable and membrane elements.
  • Using point contact elements.
  • Analysis of beam elements developing plastic hinges.
  • Introduction to construction sequence simulation.
This course assumes a good working knowledge of Strand7 and FEA and is usually attended by engineers who have completed the Introducing Strand7 course or have had at least six months Strand7 experience.


Dynamic Analysis: 8 hours
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This course addresses the growing need to undertake dynamic analysis in structural and mechanical design. Examples are taken from mechanical engineering problems such as vibrating machinery, and structural engineering problems such as earthquake response of buildings.

Some of the topics covered include:
  • Introduction to the different categories of dynamic analysis.
  • Overview of natural frequency analysis, time history analysis, harmonic response and spectral response.
  • The mode superposition method.
  • Mass matrices for dynamic analysis.
  • Damping.
  • Stress stiffening effects.
  • Random vibration and shock loading.
  • Conversion of input time history to response spectrum for spectral response analysis.
  • Earthquake analysis in accordance with AS1170.4.
  • Post-processing of results including using FFT.
This course assumes a good working knowledge of Strand7 and FEA and is usually attended by engineers who have completed the Introducing Strand7 course or have had at least six months Strand7 experience.


Structural Analysis: 16 hours
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This course covers the use of Strand7 in structural engineering applications for both sub and super-structures. The nonlinear static solver is used for analysing geometric and material non-linearity such as for buckling/collapse analysis. Dynamic solvers are used to analyse structures under the influence of earthquake excitation.

Some of the topics covered include:
  • Customised beam sections.
  • Surface contact.
  • Concrete reinforcement.
  • Fabric structures.
  • Dams.
  • Tunnels and construction sequence.
  • Buildings.
  • Foundations.
  • Cable stayed structures.
  • Pipework.
  • Element types including beam, plate, membrane (fabric) and 3D bricks.
  • The application of dead and live loads.
  • Result case combinations and enveloping.
This course assumes a good working knowledge of Strand7 and FEA and is usually attended by engineers who have completed the Introducing Strand7 course or have had at least six months of Strand7 experience.


Heat Transfer Analysis: 8 hours
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This course covers the use of Strand7 in the analysis of steady state and transient heat transfer problems.

Some of the topics covered include:
  • Overview of heat transfer theory for linear and nonlinear, steady-state and transient heat transfer.
  • The three basic modes of heat transfer: conduction, convection and radiation.
  • Heat loss/gain through a body.
  • Various forms of thermal loading and relevant element attributes.
  • Thermal boundary conditions and symmetry.
  • The use of tables for nonlinear heat transfer.
  • Using heat transfer results to determine thermal stress.
  • Other applications of the heat solver for the solution of general field problems (eg. seepage flow) may be discussed, time permitting.

Automeshing: 8 hours
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The transfer of 3D CAD data and automeshing are two very important aspects of performing accurate and efficient finite element analysis of structures. This course introduces the geometry manipulation and automeshing tools in Strand7.

Some of the topics covered include:
  • Overview of geometry representation in Strand7.
  • Importing and exporting geometry to and from CAD packages.
  • Supported CAD file formats.
  • Supported CAD entities.
  • Inspecting and evaluating geometry.
  • Preparing geometry for meshing.
  • Geometry cleaning and repair tools.
  • Evaluating meshes.
  • Meshing single and multiple parts (assemblies).
  • Combining automatic and semi-automatic meshing using Strand7 tools.
  • Application of attributes to geometry.
  • Creating CAD geometry directly within Strand7.
  • CAD models from mechanical and structural fields are used.

API Development: 4-8 hours
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The Strand7 Application Programming Interface (API) allows you to interact with Strand7 via an external computer program. This provides the capability to completely bypass the Strand7 graphical user interface and to perform specialised functions. The API is particularly powerful for automating repetetive tasks.

Some of the topics covered include:
  • An introduction to the Strand7 API.
  • Configuring the Strand7 API for use with a range of different programming environments.
  • Accessing and manipulating the Strand7 database via the Strand7 API.
  • Accessing and manipulating the Strand7 graphical display window via the Strand7 API.
  • Using the Strand7 API to modify an existing Strand7 model.
  • Using the Strand7 API to launch the Strand7 solvers.
  • Developing a simple shape optimisation tool.
  • Developing a simple structural design tool.
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