SACS 2024 Release Highlights

Pile3D – Monopile Structure Interaction Enhancements

 

Perform post-processing on monopile structures analyzed with PISA method soil reactions in Pile3D. Generate common solution files of the monopile superstructure and pile foundation for strength or fatigue code checks with SACS Post, Joint Can, or Fatigue. Pile3D has been integrated into existing Pile/Structure Interaction analysis workflows so you can now select Pile3D input files for monopile structures and SACS will automatically perform the foundation analysis with Pile3D.

 

 

Seastate – Automatic Floor Load Generation

 

Automatically generate distributed member area loads at analysis runtime with Seastate zone loads. With zone loads, users can define a series of nodes for the zone boundary, multiple openings within the boundary, ignored members for panel generation, and ignored members for tributary area calculations. Multiple pressure loads may be applied to the same zone for different load categories, and tributary loads are calculated at analysis runtime with Seastate automatically accounting for new and modified members.

 

 

 

Joint Mesher – Joint Remeshing Utility

 

Re-mesh finite element models generated by Joint Mesher with updated mesh parameters using the Joint Remeshing utility available in Precede. This feature uses a new Joint Mesh restart file created by Joint Mesher to regenerate the mesh using the original surfaces to maintain high quality meshes for curved surfaces. Portions of the mesh may be modified using the mesh refinement selection tool. More information may be found in the SACS Help documentation.

 

 

 

 

ADINA Interoperability – Non-linear Static Model Export

 

Export SACS models with non-linear material properties and soil/structure interaction curves with the SACS-ADINA Interop utility. ADINA is Bentley’s general non-linear dynamic finite element analysis software for advanced analyses and enables advanced non-linear dynamic analyses of offshore structures. Previously this feature was limited to linear static export of SACS model data with some model conversion options. This update adds the ability to export non-linear material properties of a Collapse Input file and a foundation model with non-linear pile/soil interaction springs from a PSI input file.

 

Export of the linear static model data is still accessible as a command through Precede, but export of the non-linear static requires an additional SACS ADINA Interop Input File and a SACS ADINA Interop Analysis run file accessible in the Analysis Generator under the Utilities analysis type. More information about the SACS ADINA Interop utility can be found in the Utilities manual.

 

 

SACS Cloud Services (Early Access Program)

 

Perform massively parallelized wind turbine analyses with SACS Cloud Services. The Bentley Cloud Services platform has been completely updated with improved performance, reliability, and reporting. This early access program enables anyone performing SACS Wind Turbine analyses (Uncoupled Strength, Uncoupled Fatigue, and Dynamic Superelement) to perform hundreds of analyses simultaneously in the cloud for significant performance gains when compared with traditional desktop hardware. Submit a Service Request if interested in joining the program.

 

List of Enhancements

ADINA Interop

• 1336849 - Added the ability to export elastoplastic material properties for non-linear analyses with ADINA. This feature currently supports pile/soil interaction elements through PSI input and SACS model data through Collapse input.

Documentation

• 1447460 - Added Software Validation document to SACS installer. Document available through SACS Help.

Joint Mesher

• 1211962 - Added the ability to re-mesh finite element mesh models generated by Joint Mesher with different mesh parameters. This feature requires a Joint Mesh restart file which is generated by Joint Mesher.
• 1400734 - Joints meshed with SCF extrapolation enabled through Precede Joint Mesher now support generation of post input file extrapolation data for plate and shell elements.

Pile

• 1215348 - Added the ability to expand superstructure results from Pile/Soil Interaction analyses with Pile3D to a common solution file for post-processing.
• 1215352 - Added the ability to generate pile common solution files for post-processing.

PostVue

• 1375560 - Optimized Postvue for improved performance when opening results databases.

Precede

• 1346518 - Added shell element support for Precede Joint Mesher.
• 1346523 - Added the ability to generate post input files for SCF extraction from Joint Mesher with Precede. Previously this feature was limited to Joint Mesher with Analysis Generator.

SACS Executive

• 1336842 - Added SACS ADINA Interop Analysis type under the Utilities analyses in the Analysis Generator.

Seastate

• 1332477 - Added Support for enclosed zone lines.
• 1357795 - Added the ability to generate member distributed loads from enclosed zone definitions.

List of Fixed Defects

Collapse Advanced

• 1450463 - Fixed an issue in Collapse Advanced where duplicate warning and error messages were printed with unreadable characters for the element labels.

Collapse View

• 1439480 - Fixed an issue where Precede would not display pile elements for Collapse View results.

Fatigue

• 1005215 - Updated Fatigue documentation to correct reference to fatigue load case number instead of fatigue load case name in FTCOMB input lines.
• 1354173 - Fixed an issue where spectral fatigue analyses with wave spreading on very large models could cause an error in response spectrum calculations. 

Joint Can

• 1290592 - Fixed an issue where allowable stress modifiers were not applied to RHS connections checked with CIDECT Design Guide 3 (2009).
• 1319412 - Fixed an issue where the incorrect minimum can length was calculated. In some cases, the minimum can length was calculated based on the wrong side of the brace resulting in a longer minimum can length.

Post

• 994060 - Fixed an issue where Span elements could cause Post to crash.
• 1270080 - Fixed an issue where jack-up leg and launch runner shear stresses were incorrectly reported as not a number (NaN).
• 1304860 - Fixed an issue where using concrete cross-sections could cause Post to crash.
• 1332652 - Removed a reference in the listing file to a non-existent span effective moment report.
• 1373517 - Fixed an issue where single-segment members with tapered sections could cause a crash if part of a span.
• 1392719 - Fixed an issue where unsymmetrical plate girder sections with very unsymmetrical cross-sections (plastic centroid in the flange) results in erroneously small allowable major axis bending stresses. 
• 1393563 - Added a warning message for tubular sections designed with Eurocode 3 (05) for class 4 sections (d/t > 90 eps^2) and an additional 100 to the reported UC. Previously SACS would report an infinite unity check  for these sections.
• 1397863 - Fixed an issue where SACS would fail to write the hotspot plate stress report in stress concentration factor extrapolation analyses.
• 1419679 - Fixed an issue where SACS could crash if a member was defined with near zero-length segments. Post will now generate a warning message for these segments.

PostVue

• 1011719 - Fixed an issue in Postvue where the detailed report could display incorrect hydrostatic collapse results. 
• 1012235 - Fixed an issue where Cb, B1Y, and B1Z were incorrectly reported in Postvue detailed reports for angle sections checked in AISC 15th edition.
• 1233284 - Fixed an issue where Eurocode checks on unsymmetrical plate girder sections with very large torsional moments could return incorrect unity check values. This occurred when the minor axis bending due to warping was larger than then minor axis bending and with the opposite sign.
• 1269329 - Fixed an issue where Fvy and Fvz allowable stresses were swapped in Postvue detailed reports plate girder sections. This was limited to a reporting error and did not affect unity check results.
• 1325437 - Fixed an issue where segmented members with conical cross-sections could render results on the wrong segment.
• 1381087 - Fixed an issue where Precede would exit with an error when closing mode shape extraction analysis results.
• 1393531 - Fixed an issue where slender Tee sections effective properties were incorrectly calculated when designed with Eurocode 3 (2005).

Pre

• 1368896 - Fixed an issue where shell constant pressure loads could cause a crash.

Precede

• 1013306 - Fixed an issue where weight summaries would not be displayed if a Weight ID filter was selected in the Weight Summations command of the Labeling Options dialog.
• 1332502 - Fixed an issue where Postvue displayed the incorrect effective shear area in detailed reports for tubular sections designed with Eurocode3:2005.
• 1404739 - Fixed an issue where Precede would crash when selecting a meshed joint node in the Load by Volume dialog.
• 1451453 - Fixed an issue where updating display colors in the display settings sometimes would not refresh the view.
• 1451495 - Fixed an issue where Collapse View would not display the correct color contours for pile elements in compression.
• 1475926 - Fixed an issue where Dented Tubular sections were rendered as Tubular sections.
• 1475259 - Fixed an issue where Postvue would not render skipped members with the ‘no results’ gray color.

PSI

• 1317403 - Fixed an issue where the inner tubular dimensions of concentric tubular piles would not be exported to the pile common solution file.
• 1332484 - Fixed an issue where printed soil depths for M-Theta curves in Pile3D analyses with metric units would be displayed in feet.

SACS Executive

• 1377117 - Fixed an issue where SACS Executive could crash when restoring defaults for Analysis Settings and Interactive Programs in the SACS Executive settings dialog.

Seastate

• 1005223 - Fixed an issue where transfer function plots were generated incorrectly when using the Transfer Function Loading ‘TRL’ option.
• 1427456 - Fixed an issue where Seastate could crash when the plate group override density value was 8 characters long.

Suction Bucket

• 1460363 - Fixed an issue with Suction Bucket export of English unit models. 

Utilities

• 1358269 - Fixed an issue where Ring Stiffener utility would fail to open text reports.
• 1388232 - Fixed a bug in the Python API where setting stiffness overrides for member section fields raised a python attribute-not-found exception. Fixed a bug in the Python API where setting the MemberSection.Stiffness property would crash the python module.
• 1409138 - Fixed an issue where Damage Center would return not a number (NaN) for effective period and height values.

Wave Response

• 1339224 - Fixed an issue where dummy structures were not reduced correctly for wave response analyses resulting in a mismatch between the dynamic response and the generated equivalent static load.