Air International has long made extensive use of Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) tools, particularly in the design and analysis of air conditioning systems, in-vehicle cabins, and for under-hood thermal management. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD), finite element analysis, solid modeling and other tools are frequently used. The company’s global engineering strategy has focused on responding quickly to customers and making engineering decisions based on simulation data rather than “best guess”.
When the company first began using simulation, it followed traditional methods; design engineers create concept designs and then pass them “over the wall” to analysts who create models and run simulations to determine their performance. Then, typically several weeks later, the analysts hand the results back to the design engineer.
The problem with this approach is that the analysts rarely have complete familiarity with a particular design; there is a tendency to simply pass the analysis results back to the designer rather than making suggestions for improving the design.
