RecurDyn Particles Tutorial (Basic)

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RecurDyn/Particles contains the SAMADII solver, owned and developed by Metariver Technology
co. ltd.

Edition Note
These documents describe the release information of RecurDyn V8R3

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Table of Contents
Getting Started ................................................................................................ 4
Objective ............................................................................................................................... 4
Audience ............................................................................................................................... 4
Prerequisites ......................................................................................................................... 4
Procedures ............................................................................................................................ 4
Estimated Time to Complete this Tutorial ............................................................................. 5

Creating the Initial Model................................................................................. 6

Task Objective ...................................................................................................................... 6
Estimated Time to Complete this Task ................................................................................. 6
Starting RecurDyn ................................................................................................................. 7
Modeling Geometries ............................................................................................................ 8
Creating Revolute Joints ....................................................................................................... 9
Saving the Model ................................................................................................................ 10

Creating Particles .......................................................................................... 11

Task Objectives................................................................................................................... 11
Estimated Time to Complete this Task .............................................................................. 11
Creating Particles ................................................................................................................ 12
Defining Walls ..................................................................................................................... 15
Setting Boundaries .............................................................................................................. 16

Performing Analysis ...................................................................................... 19

Task Objective .................................................................................................................... 19
Estimated Time to Complete this Task ............................................................................... 19
Performing Dynamic/Kinematic Analysis ............................................................................ 20

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Chapter

Getting Started
Objective
In this tutorial, you will learn how to:
Create particles and walls.
Define analysis boundaries in Particles.
Import/Export particle sets.

Audience
This tutorial is intended for intermediate users of RecurDyn who know how to create geometries,
joints, and force entities. All new tasks are explained thoroughly.

Prerequisites
Users should work through the 3D Slider Crank Tutorial or an equivalent tutorial before they begin
this tutorial. We also assume that you have a basic knowledge of physics.

Procedures
The tutorial consists of the procedures outlined in the following table. This table also displays the time
required to complete each procedure.
Procedures

Time (minutes)

Modeling Geometries

15

Creating Particles

Defining Walls

Defining Boundaries

Performing Dynamic/Kinematic Analysis

30

Total:

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Estimated Time to Complete this Tutorial

This tutorial takes approximately 60 minutes to complete.

RecurDyn/Particles is supported only in the RecurDyn x64 edition. If you cannot locate the
RecurDyn/Particles UI in your RecurDyn environment, then please check whether you have
installed the x64 edition of RecuDyn V8R2 or later version.
RecurDyn/Particles requires an NVIDIA graphics processing unit (GPU) that supports the
CUDA (Compute Unified Device Architecture) platform. Please ensure that your GPU supports
CUDA before you attempt to use RecurDyn/Particles. You can check whether your GPU
supports CUDA at https://developer.nvidia.com/cuda-gpus
We recommend that you use one of the following GPUs or later.
NVIDIA Tesla C/S/M 2070/2050/1060
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590/580/570/560/550 /480/470/465/460/450, etc.
We recommend that you install the latest GPU driver supplied by NVIDIA. You can download
the latest driver from the NVIDIA website:
http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us
Some newer laptops with an NVIDIA GPU may encounter problems when you try to run
simulations in RecurDyn/Particles. If this occurs, you should configure your laptop to always use
the NVIDIA GPU to run RecurDyn.

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Chapter

Creating the Initial Model

Task Objective

In this chapter, you will learn how to create a simple model that you can fill with particles and use for
analysis.

Estimated Time to Complete this Task

5 minutes

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Starting RecurDyn
To start RecurDyn and create a new model:

1.

On your Desktop, double-click the RecurDyn

shortcut.
RecurDyn starts and the Start RecurDyn
dialog box appears.

2. In the Name text box, type ParticleTest as the

name of the new model.
3. In the Gravity list, select Y. Do not change any
other options.
4. Click OK.
Tip: Characters Allowed in Entity Names

You cannot use spaces or special characters in the model name or any other RecurDyn entity name.
You can use an underscore to add spacing and improve the readability of the name.

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Modeling Geometries
In this procedure, you will make two geometries. The box of two geometries will be used to hold the
particles and for analysis.

To create two geometries:

1.

From the Body group in the Professional tab, click Cylinder.

2. Set the Creation Method toolbar to Point, Point.

Cylinder1:

Point1: 0, 0, 0

Point2: -500, 0, 0

3. From the Body group in the Professional tab, click Box.

4. Set the Creation Method toolbar to Point, Point, Depth.
Box1:

Point1: -600, 100, 0

Point2: -400, -100, 0

Depth: 200

The cylinder and box you created should resemble the example in the following figure.

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Creating Revolute Joints

In this procedure, you will create two revolute joints.
To create revolute joints:

1.

From the Joint group in the Professional tab, click Revolute.

2. In the Creation Method toolbar, set the creation method to Body, Body, Point.
RevJoint1:

Base Body: Ground

Action Body: Body1 (the cylinder)

Point: 0, 0, 0

RevJoint2:

Base Body: Body1 (the cylinder)

Action Body: Body2 (the box)

Point: -500, 0, 0

The revolute joints you created should resemble the example in the following figure.

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Tip: Changing the icon color of the joint

To change the icon color of the joint:

1. On the Home tab, in the Model Setting group, click Display.
2. In Appearance Color, select a new color for the Icon option.

Saving the Model

At this juncture in the tutorial, you should take a moment to save your model before you continue to
the next chapter.
1.

On the File menu, click Save.

2. Type the name of the model, and then select the save location.
3. Click Save.

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Chapter

Creating Particles
Task Objectives
In this chapter, you will learn how to fill the box you created in chapter 2 with particles and configure
the environment for the analysis
You will also learn the concepts behind particles, walls, material properties and boundaries.

Estimated Time to Complete this Task

10 minutes

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Creating Particles
You can use particles to fill geometries. In this procedure, you will fill the box you created in chapter 2
with particles.
To create particles in the box:

1.

From the Particle group in the Particle tab, click Particles.

2. Select Body2 (the box) to open the Create Particle Set dialog box.

3. In the Material column, click the Mat button to open the Material Properties dialog box.

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4. Click Add to create a new material property, enter 0.5 for the Damping Factor column, and
then click OK to close the dialog box.

5. Select Y for the Packing Direction option, and then enter 5 for the Radius column and 30 for
the Ratio* column.
*The ratio is the volume of the geometry that will be filled with particles. In this example, 30% of
the geometry will be filled with particles.

6. Click OK to create the Particle Set.

The particles you created should resemble the example in the following figure.

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You can select the particle you created in the Database window.

Tip: Packing Direction

If you select X for the packing direction, then the particles are arranged in the following manner.

If you select Z for the packing direction, then the particles are arranged in the following manner.

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Defining Walls
Particles interact with each other as well as with walls. Since particles do not interact with the
geometries directly, you must use the existing geometries to define walls.
In this procedure, you will define a wall using Body2 (the box), because the box will hold the particles.
Defining walls using the box:

1.

From the Particle group in the Particle tab, click Wall.

2. Click Body2 (the box) to open the Wall dialog box.

3. Click M to define the Material menu, and then select Material1. (You can also create a new
material property.)

4. Select Down for the Normal Direction option. This means that the internal surface of the
geometry will interact with the particles.

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The following figure displays the normal direction.

5. Click OK to create the wall. You can select the wall in the Database
window.

Setting Boundaries
Now, you must configure the boundaries for the particles. During analysis, the particles must exist
inside the defined boundaries otherwise the analysis can fail or produce incorrect results.
To create boundaries, you must estimate where the particles will be located during analysis and define
the boundaries based on that estimation.
Since the particles fill the box, and the box is constrained by a cylinder, the particles can exist in the
circle shown in the following figure.

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To define boundaries:

1.

From the Particle group in the Particle tab, click Boundary to open the Boundary dialog box.

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The Boundary dialog box shows the default boundary values and a model of the boundaries.

2. Enter the values shown in the following figure.

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Chapter

Performing Analysis
Task Objective
In this chapter, you will learn how to run a simulation using the model you just created.

Estimated Time to Complete this Task

5 minutes

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Performing Dynamic/Kinematic Analysis

A dynamic/kinematic analysis shows how the particles behave and move in a model.
To perform a dynamic/kinematic analysis:

1.

From the Simulation Type group in the Analysis tab, click Dyn/Kin.

2. When the Dynamic/Kinematic Analysis dialog box appears, use the default values for the
parameters in the General tab.
3.

On the Parameter tab, change the

of the Initial Time Step menu.

value

Initial Time Step: 1.e-004

4. Click Simulate.
Play

5. On the Animation toolbar, press the

button to start the animation. Refer to
3D Crank Slider tutorial for more
information on how to play animations.

the

6. Click the Stop button to reset the

model.

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Tip: Exporting/Importing Particle Sets

To export particle sets:

1. From the Particle group in the

Particle tab, click Export.
2. Select the file extension. (*.par: text
*.bin: binary file)

file,

3. Click Save to save the particle sets

current model.

in the

To import particle sets:

1.

From the Particle group in the

Particle tab, click Import.

2. Select the file to import, and then

Open.

click

Output folder

After a simulation, the program creates an output folder that stores the result files, such as the *.rad
and *.rplt files, from the simulation. The output folder also contains *.bin files that have information
about the location of each particle at each time step. You can use the Import function to import

these files.

Thanks for participating in this tutorial!

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