Support system, design support method, program, and storage medium

A design support method of supporting a user to design a convey path constituted by mechanical components by simulating a behavior of a flexible medium conveyed in the convey path, comprising:

• a creation step of creating a flexible medium model expressing a flexible medium, which is conveyed in a convey path as a design target in which an arrangement of mechanical components of the convey path is defined in advance, by using a plurality of stiff body elements each having a mass and one pair of rotational and translational springs which connect each adjacent pair of stiff body elements;
• and
• an input step of inputting information indicating which one of obverse and reverse surfaces of the flexible medium has a coated layer or toner layer formed thereon,
• wherein in the creation step, a spring coefficient of the rotational spring is determined depending on a bending direction of the flexible medium and the information which is input in the input step and indicates which one of the obverse and reverse surfaces has the coated layer or toner layer formed thereon.

A design support system which supports a user to design a convey path constituted by mechanical components by simulating a behavior of a flexible medium conveyed in the convey path, comprising:

• a flexible medium model creating apparatus which creates a flexible medium model expressing a flexible medium, which is conveyed in a convey path as a design target in which an arrangement of mechanical components of the convey path is defined in advance, by using a plurality of stiff body elements each having a mass and one pair of rotational and translational springs which connect each adjacent pair of stiff body elements and have spring constants that change depending on a direction of flexural deformation of the flexible medium;
• an input apparatus which inputs a convey condition in the convey path and frictional coefficients between the mechanical components arranged in the convey path and the flexible medium;
• a motion calculation apparatus which time-serially calculates a behavioral state of the flexible medium in the convey path by numerical simulation on the basis of the flexible medium model and the input convey condition and frictional coefficients;
• and
• a result display apparatus which displays the behavioral state of the flexible medium which is calculated by said motion calculation means,
• wherein if a bending moment of each of the stiff body elements which is calculated by said motion calculation apparatus by numerical simulation is analyzed, and it is determined that a rotation moment larger than a predetermined value has locally occurred in the flexible medium, said flexible medium model creating apparatus increases a segmentation count that has been set in segmenting the flexible medium into a plurality of stiff body elements.

A design support method of supporting a user to design a convey path constituted by mechanical components by simulating a behavior of a flexible medium conveyed in the convey path, comprising:

• a flexible medium model creating step of creating a flexible medium model expressing a flexible medium, which is conveyed in a convey path as a design target in which an arrangement of mechanical components of the convey path is defined in advance, by using a plurality of stiff body elements each having a mass and one pair of rotational and translational springs which connect each adjacent pair of stiff body elements and have spring constants that change depending on a direction of flexural deformation of the flexible medium;
• an input step of inputting a convey condition in the convey path and frictional coefficients between the mechanical components arranged in the convey path and the flexible medium;
• a motion calculation step of time-serially calculating a behavioral state of the flexible medium in the convey path by numerical simulation on the basis of the flexible medium model and the input convey condition and frictional coefficients;
• a result display step of displaying the behavioral state of the flexible medium which is calculated in the motion calculation step, and
• a re-segmentation step of, if a bending moment of each of the stiff body elements which is calculated in the motion calculation step by numerical simulation is analyzed, and it is determined that a rotation moment larger than a predetermined value has locally occurred in the flexible medium, increasing a segmentation count that has been set in segmenting the flexible medium into a plurality of stiff body elements.