Enabling Digital Continuity in Virtual Manufacturing for Eco-Efficiency Assessment of Lightweight Structures by Means of a Domain-Specific Structural Mechanics Language: Requirements, Idea and Proof of Concept

Abstract

Virtual product development involves a wide range of specialized assessment tools, each tailored to specific physical phenomena and modeling requirements. A formalized, yet flexible, way to establish interfaces between these tools is required for their efficient use in automated virtual product development processes. This document presents a novel approach for the interaction of different assessment capabilities in a virtual product development process based on a solver-agnostic domain-specific language (DSL) for computational structural mechanics problems. The proposed system enables seamless integration with various assessment capabilities and solvers. The DSL is designed to handle multiple numerical implementation methods, including finite element method, peridynamic, and others. The approach utilizes a hierarchical data model, separating mathematical, physical, mechanical, and simulation data into distinct containers, facilitating modularity and reusability. The DSL is derived from code in a Java-based backend Java mechanics suite and provides interfaces to external tools and solvers through plugins. Using this approach, it is shown how tools and data from different solver ecosystems and data formats can be seamlessly interacted in the structural assessment for the optimization of eco-efficiency key performance indicators in the manufacturing of lightweight structures.