Learning Forum

[Erling Gjeset]

I am still not sure what caused the original error and what to do with it, but I have found a way to make sure there is a good and active connection between Inventor and Ansys Workbench / Ansys Maxwell. I will post this here for anyone who might have similar issues in the future.

1. A very good tutorial presentation on Maxwell geometry operations is found here: ansoft-maxwell.narod.ru, where the last slides cover CAD integration
2. As shown in the screenshot in the first post, and as noted both in the tutorial and in the comments: Make a separate geometry block in Workbench with a link to the geometry cell in the Maxwell block.
   • The link works best when there is no postprocessing of the geometry by any of the Ansys geometry applications. This is in my experience the main reason for the error. Make sure that the CAD geometry can be used by Maxwell as-is
3. In order to link parameters, you will need the "Workbench associative interface" for your preferred CAD program, which can be installed via the Ansys CAD Configuration Manager. The parameters you want to manage needs to have the prefix "DS_" (can be changed in Workbench import parameters)
4. The CAD program needs to be running with the active geometry open in order for the link to work. Running Workbench/Maxwell without this set will break the connection. I have not yet found a way to fix this once it's broken other than resetting the geometry block
5. Make sure that your CAD geometry generates without errors within the range of parameter values you want to sweep. Broken geometry may also break the system
6. The parametric sweep is run through Maxwell directly, not via the "parameters" table in Workbench

As can be seen, there are a lot of issues to watch out for in order for it to run smoothly, and I have probably not created an extensive list. This is just a summary of my experiences so far trying to make a parametric CAD model from another program be simulated in Workbench. I am by no means an expert, and I would appreciate any and all feedback in order to improve CAD connection. 

Hope this helps!