Got a question about NovaFlow&Solid?
Here are answers to the most common questions we get. If you still can’t find the answer to your specific issue, you are always welcome to contact our support team.
General Q&A's
By simulating your castings before production, you will be able to predict the flow and temperature, calculate feeders, as well as check for hot spots, stresses and shrinkages.
In principle, any casting material can be simulated provided that there is material data in the database for it. The NovaFlow&Solid database is quite comprehensive from the start but there are of course materials missing. The material groups we have are: steel of various kinds from unalloyed to high alloyed, cast irons, aluminum alloys, magnesium alloys, copper based alloys, zinc alloys, Titanium alloys, Super-alloys (Nickel based, Cobalt based) and jewelry alloys like Gold and Silver. If a material is missing you/we can either add it to the database or copy and modify an existing alloy or purchase the material data from JmatPro. All materials give you the ability to simulate micro and macro shrinkages, cold flows and gas porosities. If the material has stress enabled data you can also make simulations to look for cold and hot tears as well as studying the dimensional changes of the part.
In principle all commercial casting methods can be simulated; all types of gravity casting, centrifugal casting, investment casting, low pressure die casting, counter gravity casting, high pressure die casting, vacuum assisted casting, lost foam casting and squeeze casting.
We understand your wish to see our system “for real”. Click here to request a demo.
No, all types of methods with its special technology is included in base version at no extra cost.
This works automatically in NovaFlow&Solid and it comes with no extra cost if you want to use 1 core or 2 or 4 or more.
NovaFlow&Solid supports Windows 7, 8.1 and 10 but it must be 64-bit OS. Older operative systems may work but we are not supporting them.
No we have early decided that Windows should be the focus in order to make the best possible solution on that platform. Windows is also the most common system in the industry and has come strong also on advanced applications the last 10 – 15 years.
We are using the Finite Volume Meshing method (FVM). This method has flexible mesh elements that normally are cubic but can take any shape to describe the contour of the casting.
The mathematical model is well described in the books: Landay L.D. “Elasticity theory” and Sedov L.I. ” Mechanics of continuous medium”.
Yes, press F1 to go to the HTML Help, or choose it in the menu. Here you find topics for all parts of the software and you can also search in the help function.
You can either slightly change one of the existing materials or you can through us purchase Jmatpro data, which is theoretically calculated data. However the database is quite comprehensive already from the start with most EN and ASTM standard alloys.
Yes, we have this and you can mail us on support@novacast.se to get a link to the instruction video files directory.
The HASP key is a USB stick that contains your license file and works as your software key. This key needs to be activated in order to run the software.
GGI (Good Guys’ Index) is an improved variant of looking at yield improvement and weight savings. The purpose of the GGI program is to visualize the weight, energy and environmental savings you can do in your process. It measures each variant of casting setup and there you see the differences between them and the savings. Our recommendations are to use GGI for continuous improvements of your castings.
GGI is a new index that has not yet been approved by different organizations. We hope that this will happen in the next years. We will base it on official data and statistics for energy consumption and emission levels.
By changing the casting layout you can lower the weight of the ingate system, feeders and that will result in a weight reduction and those factors you calculate and simulate in NovaFlow&Solid. This weight reduction means something in terms of saved melt energy and saved CO2 emissions. It is based on emission or energy per ton. The electrical costs are different in different countries which means that you can set this yourself in the calculation. Also, you are able to set electricity source.
Installation issues
The NovaFlow&Solid HASP key shall only be activated when a new version is released (examples: NovaFlow&Solid 4.7, 6.0 and 6.3), not when upgrades of a version (examples: 4.7r2, 6.0r5 and 6.3r3).
The installation was incomplete. To fully install NovaFlow&Solid, you need to manually run the MFC files in the subfolder “mfc80” and also the two SQL files in subfolder “SQL_compact”.
It means that the HASP key is not activated for this version. Contact support@novacast.se for activation.
The rule is “the fewer the elements the shorter the time”. If you compare FVM (which is used in NovaFlow&Solid) with FDM you should aim for a similar number of elements in the wall thickness, which for FDM should be 3 elements. If you apply three elements in FDM you get a very rough simulation but with FVM it is enough and the calculation time is really short. You can also use our dual meshing method that enables use of different mesh resolution for moldfilling and solidification. This really shortens the simulation time as well.