Abstract
B&W Engineering, a Germany-based consulting and service provider specializing in complete medical device development, sought to improve the efficiency and accuracy of a life-sustaining peristaltic pump while reducing prototype cycles and accelerating time to market. The project required maintaining stringent safety margins, achieving a constant and accurate flow rate, and accounting for complex fluid, thermal, and fluid-structure-interaction behavior. By implementing Siemens’ Simcenter STAR-CCM+ and NX software, B&W Engineering gained critical insights into the pump’s fluid and thermal behavior and was able to perform stable, robust simulations of complex hyperplastic materials. The solution helped optimize the pump design, reduce prototype cycles and development costs, improve drug delivery accuracy by 3 percent, and bring the life-sustaining medical device to market faster.
Key Takeaways:
- Improved peristaltic pump efficiency: Simulation-driven design improvements helped increase pump efficiency and reduce physical prototype cycles.
- Integrated simulation and design: Simcenter STAR-CCM+ and NX provided a comprehensive environment for analyzing and developing the pump.
- Fluid and thermal analysis: Simcenter STAR-CCM+ enabled detailed fluid, thermal, and electromagnetic analysis of the pump.
- Optimized thermal performance: Simulation helped reduce housing thickness from 3 mm to 2.5 mm, improving heat dissipation while maintaining temperature requirements.
- Accurate drug delivery: The new pump generation achieved the lowest drug delivery rate compared with other pumps at the time and improved delivery accuracy by 3 percent.
- Stable fluid-structure-interaction simulation: Simcenter STAR-CCM+ enabled stable and robust simulations involving hyperplastic materials and multiphase calculations.
- Accurate tubing deformation analysis: Simulation enabled accurate prediction of tubing behavior and drug delivery rates during the pump’s operation.
- Reduced prototype costs: With individual prototypes costing upwards of €80,000, simulation reduced the need for physical prototypes and lowered development costs.
- Faster time to market: NX and Simcenter STAR-CCM+ streamlined the design process, helping B&W Engineering bring the life-sustaining pump to market faster.
- Enhanced design precision: Engineers could analyze critical tolerances separately and focus on key design issues, increasing precision and improving the overall development process.
