The Institute of Thermal Turbomachinery and Machinery Laboratory forms part of the famous University of Stuttgart. The Institute teaches and performs research providing the necessary knowledge to develop and operate highly efficient, reliable and affordable thermal turbomachinery. Their focus of research is in different areas of energy conversion including gas turbines, steam turbines and turbochargers, which is of great relevance in today’s society.
The institute came to us with a specific requirement of data translation and migration. They had possession of an old test rig (def) dating back to 1960; this test rig is a closed loop axial compressor test rig, used to investigate different compressor designs with both air and freon. Built in Switzerland, the test rig resided at the EPFL until it was passed on to Stuttgart University. The test rig has been modified extensively by PhD students over the years, but between 1999 and 2000 one of its last PhD students digitised all technical drawings using an old HP system and I-DEAS.
The institute now wants to use the major parts of the old test rig to build a new version to investigate the airflow on blade vibrations of axial compressor rotors. Their stumbling block was that they required the test rig’s old CAD data in a readable format to enable their new parts to fit into the existing casing.
The institute received the test rig’s I-DEAS TDM CAD data in a UNIX format (before Windows), which was not only incompatible with their current CAD software, but they had no means of migrating the data due to its UNIX formatting.
Our specialist data services team at Majenta Solutions took the existing CAD data, migrated it over to Windows, opened and checked it before outputting into an NX format which was then compatible with the institute’s internal software. We then used our data exchange platform, MX to transfer the CAD data to the Institute.
We managed to migrate the old CAD data within a few days of sending it from the institute, preventing any delay in their project and they are now finalising the design of the new test rig.
“As we had tried several options before contacting Majenta, none of which worked, I was very happy to find Majenta on the internet, this was one of our last chances to get access to the data.”
Our years of experience in supporting OEMs and suppliers with their supplier integration processes, working with maintaining interoperability with workflows allowed us to action the institute’s requirement immediately. We work with over 200 customers and have experience with many CAD solutions.
“It was impressive how fast Majenta responded to my request and how fast we had access to our data.”
Our MX platform then delivered the migrated data over to the institute securely, and with a full audit trail, enabling us to track the delivery, when it had been download and by who.
“The platform worked without any problems, providing me with two zip files with my data.”
Patrick Buchwald
ITSM, University of Stuttgart