PARAMETRIC CAD MODELING FOR IMPLEMENTING LOOPS IN GEOMETRY CREATION: AN OPENSCAD AND ANSYS SPACECLAIM COMPARISON

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) plays an important role in analyzing equipment and processes, such as in scale-up. Generally, the initial step of a CFD study is the creation of a geometry, which, in cases of scale-up analyses or the creation of complex structures, becomes a laborious task. This work aimed to compare two computer-aided-design (CAD) software: Ansys SpaceClaim, a commercial software, and OpenSCAD, an open-source software, in relation to scripted parametrization of geometries. It was evaluated that for creating simpler geometries, Ansys SpaceClaim works well, but the lack of information about the script language makes the problem solving difficult. On the other hand, for creating more complex geometries, OpenSCAD performs better, despite requiring a geometry cleaning step.