A Guiding Design System for Pressure Vessels based on 3D CAD

Abstract

The design of pressure vessel is an extremely professional job which has heavy workload, repeated work, and rich accumulated knowledge, and it has good characteristics of serialization, generalization, standardization. Generic 3D CAD systems are not suitable for pressure vessel design. On the contrary, customized development based on 3D CAD system is needed. In this paper, a new pressure vessel design system based on Chinese 3D CAD system named SINOVATION was developed to improve design efficiency and accuracy. First, the functions and construction of pressure vessel design system were presented with the analysis of the traditional design process of pressure vessels. Second, related design specifications were managed and used flexibly in pressure vessel design system, and general parts library and standard parts library were established to improve parts reuse and accumulation. Finally, a guiding design mode was accepted for typical vessels and components to design same product series while direct modeling function was used for atypical pressure vessels. The results show that this method is helpful for embedded use of design specifications, standards and knowledge, and also provides an extensive interface for product updates and diversification. Statistical data reports and accurate engineering drawings are generated automatically based on 3D models. The quality, efficiency, and consistence are greatly improved. With the implementation and application, the system has been highly commended by customers in Chinese pressure vessel industry, especially in petrochemical industry.