GM BoltStudio: A Suite of Extensions to Abaqus/CAE for Simulating Bolted Assemblies at General Motors

General Motors, in conjunction with SIMULIA Great Lakes, have developed a studio of
Abaqus/CAE plug-ins designed to increase the efficiency of their analysts in the definition of their model assemblies. These plug-in are written to bridge the gaps and to enhance the usability of native tools in Abaqus/CAE specifically for bolt joint assembly simulation. The main advantage of the plug-in studio is improved efficiency, both in terms of time saving and modeling accuracy/consistency. Secondary benefits include the ability to enable less experienced users leverage the complex modeling methods encapsulated by each plug-in. This paper presents a few of the developed plug-ins, describing for each the process captured. One of these tools, the ‘bolt library’ is available to the wider Abaqus user community.