Within the various disciplines of engineering and science, Finite Element Analysis is becoming ever more widely used. Originally developed for aerospace structural analysis, FEA has grown to provide a convenient and speedy tool for approximation of the solution to a wide variety of complicated engineering problems. In the hands of a competent user, the method of FEA can produce accurate, reliable approximate solutions, at a small fraction of the cost of more rigorous, closed-form analyses. There exist any number of software packages for the performance of FEA, which are commercially available. Thus, basic knowledge of the background theory and knowledge of best practices of FEA is sufficient to allow an engineer to perform finite element analysis, once a software package is obtained and the engineer has time to learn its use. Note however, that there is still much room for misuse of the software, among unskilled users.
ASME offers an intro and advanced course in this discipline. These online courses are instructor-led and include an educational version of ANSYS software (Shipping &Handling extra). 2.25 CEU's are available upon successful completion of each course (75% or better).
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