It is true to say that in many instances, the best way to learn complex behaviour is by means of imitation. For instance, most of us learned to walk, to talk, and to throw a ball solely by imitating the actions and speech of those around us. To a considerable extent, the same approach can be adopted to learn to use the ANSYS programme by imitation, using the examples provided in this book. This is the essence of the philosophy and innovative approach used in the book. The authors have attempted to provide readers with a comprehensive cross-section of analysis types in a variety of engineering areas, in order to provide a broad choice of examples to be imitated in one's own work. In developing these examples, the authors’ intent has been to demonstrate many programme features and refinements. By displaying these features in an assortment of disciplines and analysis types, the authors hope to give readers the confidence to employ these programme enhancements in their own ANSYS applications.

The primary aim of the book is to assist in learning the use of ANSYS through examples taken from various areas of engineering. The content and treatment of the subject matter are considered to be most appropriate for university students studying engineering and for practising engineers who wish to learn the use of ANSYS. The book is exclusively structured around ANSYS, and no other finite element (FE) software currently available is considered. In this second edition of the book, revised and updated, ANSYS version 17 is used throughout. Although the fundamentals underlying ANSYS have not changed, nevertheless there are some subtle differences between the latest version and the version used in the first edition of the book, and these differences are incorporated in the second edition of the book. Also, instead of FLOTRAN used in the first edition, FLUENT—a new module of the programme—is utilised to solve illustrative examples. Moreover, some new solved examples have been introduced in order to bring the contents of the book closer to practical engineering applications.

The book is organised into seven chapters. Chapter 1 introduces a reader to fundamental concepts of the FE method. In Chapter 2 an overview of ANSYS is presented. Chapter 3 deals with example problems concerning stress analysis. Chapter 4 contains solved problems pertinent to dynamics of machinery. Chapter 5 is devoted to fluid dynamics problems, while Chapter 6 shows how to use ANSYS to solve problems typical in the field of thermos-mechanics. Finally, Chapter 7 outlines the approach, through solved examples, to problems related to contact and surface mechanics of machine elements.

The authors are of the opinion that the book is very timely as there is a considerable demand, primarily from university engineering courses, for a book that could be used to teach, in a practical way, ANSYS—a premiere finite element analysis computer programme. In addition, practising engineers increasingly use ANSYS for computer-based analyses of various systems, hence there is a need for a book that they could use in a self-learning mode.

The strategy used in this book, i.e. to enable readers to learn ANSYS by means of imitation, is quite unique and thus differs significantly from that in other books where ANSYS is also involved.