Simcenter Nastran
The Industry Standard Finite Element Solver for Stress and Structural Analysis
One Solver with Solutions for Simulating Product Performance
Characteristics of Structures and Mechanical Components

What is Simcenter Nastran?
Simcenter Nastran is a finite element (FE) solver for stress, vibration, buckling, structural failure, heat transfer, acoustics and aeroelasticity analyses.
Manufacturers as well as engineering suppliers in aerospace, automotive, electronics, heavy machinery, medical device, and other industries have relied on Simcenter Nastran software for their critical engineering computing needs for over 40 years. It allows them to produce safe, reliable and, optimized designs within increasingly shorter design cycles.
Simcenter Nastran is directly compatible to analyze composite structures, with individual ply representation.
Multiple Solutions – One Solver
Linear Analysis
Linear analysis assumes that materials are not strained beyond their yield limits and that deformations remain small in relation to overall dimensions.
Nonlinear Analysis
When deformations are large, linear material assumptions are invalid, or contact is a factor, then nonlinear analysis is the appropriate simulation choice.
Dynamic Analysis
Dynamic analysis is an important known strength of Simcenter Nastran. From transient, to frequency, to random loading, to shock response, Simcenter Nastran covers the full range of dynamic solutions.
Optimization
Using optimization techniques, engineers can improve a proposed design, resulting in the best possible product for minimum cost.
Aeroelastic Analysis
Aeroelastic analysis enables analysis of structural models in the presence of an airstream.
Rotor Dynamic Analysis
Rotor dynamic analysis allows engineers to predict critical speeds for their systems and develop designs that operate away from these unstable speeds.
Having all these solutions in one solver means that input/output file formats are the same for all solution types.
Simcenter Nastran Basic
Linear surface to surface contact and glued connection that can be defined either between element faces or geometry surfaces and is easily set up with Femap’s assembly management functionality.
- Edge-to-surface contact to glue the edges of shell elements to the faces of solid or shell elements
- Surface-to-surface contact for shell and solid elements
- Edge-to-edge glue between the edges of shell, axisymmetric, plane stress and plane strain elements
- Inertia relief for unrestrained models
- Shared memory parallel (SMP) processing enabled element-based iterative solver for very fast solutions of tetrahedron meshed models
- Bolt preload effects
- Thermal expansion for rigid elements
Linear Static Demonstration
The heat transfer capability provides solutions to steady state and transient thermal analysis and design problems.
- Heat transfer can span the full range from system-level analysis of global energy balances to the detailed analysis associated with temperature and thermal stress limit levels.
- Allows you to investigate linear or nonlinear problems, steady-state or transient effects, as well as all three types of heat transfer (conduction, convection and radiation), displaying the characteristics associated with each.
Steady State Thermal Analysis Demonstration
The basic nonlinear capabilities include nonlinear static and transient analyses that include large displacement and nonlinear material analysis as well as gap and slide line contact.
- Enables you to analyze models with geometric nonlinearities; that is, large deformations or with material nonlinearities.
- Point-to-point contact nonlinearity can also be simulated. This basic nonlinear capability allows users to evaluate whether the small displacement and linear material assumptions used in linear analysis are accurate.
Basic Nonlinear Demonstration
Simcenter Nastran Advanced Bundle
Simcenter Nastran Add-On Analysis Modules
Material models that can be used include: elastic isotropic, elastic orthotropic, composites, gasket materials, elastic-plastic, hyperelastic, temperature dependent, nonlinear elastic and elastic creep.
Solution capabilities include: static solutions, dynamic solutions, creep analysis, load displacement control, and automatic time stepping. Surface contact capabilities include: single and double sided, self contact, all contact, friction models, offsets, and rigid and flexible contact surfaces.