Solutions
Undercuts, thin walls, hot spots and missing draft usually surface at first article, when the pattern or the die already exists. Partimation flags them on the uploaded part with the rule that caught each one, and runs GPU fill and solidification physics on every casting job — before anyone commits steel.
Where it shows up
The pattern is cut, the first parts are poured, and only then does anyone talk about the section that won't feed or the face with no draft on it. Every decision that caused it was made months earlier, by someone who wasn't in that conversation.
Somebody in the shop could have looked at the model and called it in ten seconds. The model went from the designer to the supplier without passing them, and the knowledge stayed where it was.
By the time the problem is real, a CAD edit isn't the option any more. What's on the table is tool rework, a change order, and a delivery date that moves for everyone downstream.
Fill and solidification analysis means a specialist and a slot in their week, so it runs on the jobs already judged worth it. The scrap tends to come from the ones that weren't.
What it costs
A defect caught while the model is still soft is a geometry edit that nobody bills for. The same defect caught at first article is tool rework or a new pattern, a scrapped pour, a first-article slot burned, a delivery date that moves, and a yield the quote was struck on that nobody can defend any more. The engineering change is the small part of that list. The schedule and the trust are not, and neither of them shows up on the quote you already sent.
How it plays out
Thin walls, hot spots, undercuts and missing draft are flagged on any uploaded part and mapped onto the 3D model, each carrying the rule that caught it — before anyone has committed to casting, machining or anything else. MFGDFM.
GPU lattice-Boltzmann fill returns fill order, the last regions to fill and trapped-air risk; transient solidification returns freeze order and which risers actually feed. Both run as part of the job rather than as a specialist exercise booked separately. SimDFM.
Casting, molding, forging, machining, sheet metal and additive get screened together, each coming back feasible, marginal or infeasible with the constraint that drove the verdict — so a part that was never going to cast says so in writing. ProcessDFM.
The pattern, core boxes or die the part needs price through one shared block-and-machining model and amortize into the per-piece should-cost curve, so what's at risk in a re-cut is a figure rather than a shock. ToolDFM.
Already shipped
Fill and solidification analysis normally means booking a specialist, which means it runs on the work already judged important — and the scrap arrives from the work that wasn't. Here the GPU fill run and the transient solidification run happen on every casting job, inside the quote rather than beside it. Every result names its confidence basis — a published prior, your own calibrated actuals, a deterministic rule, or a flag that it needs a human — so you know how hard to lean on it before you act.
Built into MFGDFM.
Built into SimDFM.
Built into MFGDFM.
Built into ProcessDFM.
Built into ToolDFM.
Built into SimDFM.
See it for your team
FAQ
Screen the geometry before anyone commits steel. Thin walls, hot spots, undercuts and missing draft are flagged on the uploaded part and mapped onto the 3D model, each with the rule that caught it, and the findings arrive on any upload before a process has been picked. That ordering is the whole point: early enough and the fix is a CAD change, late enough and it is tool rework.
Geometry problems — wall thickness, draft, a heavy section that will never feed — cost almost nothing to fix while the model is still soft, and a great deal once a pattern or die exists. The window closes the day tooling is committed. Running fill and solidification on every casting job, instead of booking a specialist for the important ones, is what keeps the check inside it.
Work out first whether the problem is the rigging or the part. Transient solidification returns freeze order and which risers actually feed, and the fill run returns fill order, the last regions to fill and where air gets trapped. A feeding problem may be answerable in the gating; a section that will never feed is a geometry conversation, and better to have it knowingly than at the next first article.
Naming the defect turns a supplier's price into a specific discussion. Each finding carries the rule that caught it and each process verdict names the constraint behind it, so someone with no casting background can put an exact question to a foundry — this section, this rule — and get an answer, rather than accepting a scrap allowance nobody has ever explained.
Casting, molding, forging, machining, sheet metal and additive are screened together off one upload, each returning feasible, marginal or infeasible with the constraint that drove it. A part heading for a pattern that was never going to cast well gets caught in the same pass that would have caught a part better off machined, and both verdicts arrive with a reason attached.
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