Thermal Stress Analysis of Aluminum Pump Housing

Front view of the aluminum pump housing.

Convection condition of the pump housing.

Background

This is an assignment for my ME-441 Computer Simulation and Analysis class. In the Computer Simulation and Analysis class ANSYS Workbench and Discovery AIM were used extensively to simulate. Instructions were provided, and sometimes the models, either from Creo Parametric or SolidWorks, were provided as well. Some assignments however need the objects to be modelled from scratch or modified before hand.

The assignment

In this assignment, an aluminum pump housing undergoes a thermal stress analysis using ANSYS Workbench Steady-State Thermal and Static Structural. The temperature on the surface of the pump housing is held at a constant 60 C. The temperature of the interior of the pump housing is held at a constant 90 C. For the convection of air, the temperature is 20 C. Frictionless supports are applied at the bottom face and the screw holes near the edge of the pump housing.

Results

The results of this assignment include the temperature and heat flux distribution for the steady state thermal analysis, and the Von Mises stress, total deformation, and safety factor for the static structural analysis. The images of these results can be seen below.