Case Study: Ingeniacity achieves 65% bowsprit mass reduction with Altair HyperWorks

HyperWorks Enables Ingeniacity to Reduce Mass of Sailing Yacht Composite Bowsprit by 65 Percent

Ingeniacity, a Spanish engineering service provider, was hired to design and optimize a composite bowsprit for a Swan 50 yacht with the dual challenge of maximizing stiffness while minimizing weight and avoiding buckling under high rigging loads. To meet these conflicting objectives the team relied on Altair’s HyperWorks CAE suite, notably HyperMesh for meshing and OptiStruct for composite-specific optimization and pretension handling.

Using Altair HyperWorks (HyperMesh and OptiStruct) Ingeniacity combined topology, buckling and ply-sequence optimization and virtual load testing to iterate quickly without physical prototypes; OptiStruct completed the key analyses in about an hour. The optimized bowsprit dropped from 54 kg to 19 kg (a 34 kg, ~65% reduction), met stiffness requirements, and significantly reduced development time and cost.

Ingeniacity

Ignacio Melón

CAE Engineer