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Lessons From a Failed Model Development Project

Lessons From a Failed Model Development Project

Apr 29, 2025

Some years ago, I attended a meeting of senior engineers at a Fortune 100 company. The topic of discussion was: What should be done about the significant discrepancies between outcomes predicted by finite element models and those observed in physical tests? The chief engineer, who called the meeting, vented his frustration, declaring he was tired of hearing that the finite element mesh was the problem. He no longer believed the predictions from finite element modeling and had lost confidence in the engineers who produced those results. How could this have been prevented?

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  • “A screening of existent commercial and non-commercial tools was carried out in respect to their fracture mechanics capabilities, their design abilities, implementation as well as their complexity. Although, there are many software possibilities, only those within the reach of the author were evaluated. This resulted in the selection of the commercial tool StressCheck. The assessment of crack propagation on compact tension and two stringer specimens governed by the Paris and Forman regimes was satisfactory compared with experimental results using the material data from simple standard specimens.”

    Lloren Llopart Prieto (EADS)
    Doctoral Thesis, "Modelling and analysis of crack turning on aeronautical structures"

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“At DST Group, we have effectively used StressCheck over the last 10 years to determine accurate stress intensity factors. The results have been used to improve our residual strength and structural life estimates for aircraft in service with the Royal Australian Airforce, including C-130, P-3C and F/A-18 A/B. We have found it to be extremely easy to use and a very versatile code with which to create parametric models.

We have recently used StressCheck to obtain improved stress intensity factor solutions (Improved stress intensity factors for selected configurations in cracked plates and Improved stress intensity factors for a single corner crack at a loaded fastener hole) for five key generic configurations. These transferable parametric results have been published externally. One specific example is the non-linear contact analysis of a cracked, filled fastener hole, with both fastener and remote plate loading.”

Dr. Manfred Heller, Head, Structural & Damage Mechanics, DST Group

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