Benefits
Events
Products & Programs
Author:
Yogiraj Deshpande
Engineer II – Technical Marketing
Picture this: it’s Friday afternoon, and you’re hunched over your workstation trying to set up what feels like the 100th variation of a similar geometry, clicking through the same menus, applying the same boundary conditions, and configuring the same solver settings you have used countless times before. In most cases, the geometry changes, but the conditions and process remain the same. It ends up taking a significant portion of your workday. Sometimes the bottleneck isn’t computing power or simulation capacity—it’s the workflow itself. Hours go by, setting up simulations that could easily be automated.
That’s where automation comes in, not as a shortcut, but as a smarter way to work. It’s about letting machines do what they do best: repeat the same task over and over without getting bored, while you focus on what actually requires engineering judgement: analyzing results, interpreting trends, and making design decisions that move projects forward. With automation, you can standardize your simulations and run hundreds of design variations one-by-one or in batches. The benefits go beyond time savings—automation increases efficiency, improves consistency, and allows you to explore far more designs than manual workflows ever could. It also democratizes CFD access, allowing non-CFD engineers to run validated simulations independently.
In this blog, we’ll explore CONVERGE Studio’s automation capabilities and see how they can transform your workflow from “Why is this taking so long?” to “Wait, I’m already done?”
CONVERGE offers several ways to streamline simulation workflows—templates, custom panels, and scripting, each suited to different needs and levels of complexity.
Templates are predefined simulation setups that can be easily reused and modified based on case requirements, allowing you to begin with a verified, validated setup. They are particularly useful for systematic parametric studies. For example, when evaluating how different inlet flow rates affect pressure drop, you can lock in your mesh settings, turbulence models, and solver configurations, then simply change the boundary conditions, i.e., inflow rates, for each run. This is ideal for CFD engineers conducting design of experiments (DOE), where setup consistency is critical for meaningful comparisons.
Scripting is an advanced method that allows for complete control over your workflow and enables end-to-end automation of simulations via scripts. You can set up cases, update templates, run simulations sequentially or in parallel, and even post-process results. CONVERGE Studio supports Java-based scripting. Needless to say, to automate your workflow using scripts, you need to have some level of coding expertise.
Custom panel is the latest automation method added to CONVERGE Studio. Being a mix of templates and scripting, it allows you to create an independent user-defined panel to see and modify only the parameters of interest without needing to go through every case setup parameter. Custom panels bridge the gap between manual effort and full automation, and enable non-CFD engineers to simulate and compare designs using pre-validated workflows.
To see this in action, let’s walk through a real-world example: drill bit simulations, where complex geometries and multiple design iterations make custom panels especially valuable.
Before we dive into the drill bit example, here’s what makes custom panels powerful: you have complete control over how you build them. You decide what parameters to include, how the interface should look, and what gets automated. Parameters can either be direct solver inputs or user-friendly custom inputs that your script converts into the values the solver needs—giving you flexibility to design an interface that’s intuitive for your users. The custom panel editor lets you add tabs, variables linked to CONVERGE solver parameters, input fields, buttons that trigger scripted operations, and other elements to build an interface that matches your workflow needs. The drill bit panel we’ll explore is just one approach; your panels can look and work completely differently depending on your workflow needs. Note that custom panels are available starting in CONVERGE Studio 4.
Setting up a drill bit simulation is often tedious because of the intricate geometry. There are multiple nozzles, junk slots, cutters, and flow passages—all requiring extensive boundary flagging, assignment of boundary conditions, and different mesh refinement strategies. For a single geometry, once you finish flagging the boundaries, setting up the case doesn’t usually take much time in CONVERGE Studio. However, if you’re simulating several designs with only minor variations, you’ll need to repeat the complete process for each design, making most of the workflow redundant.
Custom panels enable you to skip these repetitive steps and simplify the entire case setup process. The key is establishing a strategic naming convention in your CAD tool that the custom panel script can interpret. You’ll need to name your geometry surfaces correctly before importing them into CONVERGE—this is how the script knows what boundary conditions to assign.
For this drill bit panel, we’ve programmed the script to recognize specific naming patterns: any boundary name ending with ‘_BOT’ gets identified as a component below junk slots, names ending with ‘_TOP’ are components above junk slots, anything starting with ‘NOZZLE’ (NOZZLE1, NOZZLE2, etc.) gets assigned nozzle boundary conditions, names starting with ‘JUNKSLOT’ are identified as junk slots, boundaries starting with ‘B’ are recognized as cutters, and standard boundaries are named STALK, INLET, and OUTLET. Of course, you can define whatever naming scheme makes sense for your application—just program your custom panel script to recognize those patterns.
Once the imported CAD geometry adheres to this naming convention, the custom panel script parses all boundary labels, identifies which surfaces belong to which group, and automatically constructs the corresponding regions. The script creates regions, assigns correct boundary types, and sets up each region with appropriate fluid and solid properties and solver settings from your template case. Critical regions, such as nozzle exits and cutter edges, automatically receive higher mesh resolution through volumetric embedding regions and boundary-based embeddings, referencing refinement parameters from the template case. A preview window displays the geometry with color-coded boundaries so you can verify that everything is correct.
The user inputs section enables you to assign inlet conditions, outlet pressure, yield stress, viscosity, power index, consistency index, and other relevant parameters. You can choose which parameters to put in the user inputs section based on your needs. The script updates only the values specified through the custom panel, pulling everything else from the verified template case.
With this workflow, all you need to do is import the CAD file, clean the geometry, fill in custom panel inputs, click Apply, and run CONVERGE. Custom panels can be tailored to match your specific workflow requirements—this drill bit example demonstrates just one possible implementation.
Workflow automation in CONVERGE isn’t just about saving time—it’s about transforming how you work. By handing off repetitive tasks to automation, you free yourself to focus on what truly matters: exploring more design alternatives, conducting deeper analyses, and making better engineering decisions. Custom panels bridge the gap between manual setup and full automation, enabling both CFD specialists and non-CFD engineers to work more efficiently. You can create panels tailored to your specific workflow requirements—whether for drill bit simulations, engine analysis, thermal management, or any specialized application you need. If you’d like to explore a drill bit custom panel example hands-on, one is available in the CONVERGE Studio example repository. Navigate to File > Load example case > General > Drilling Custom Panel Steady RANS (as shown in Figure 3). Once you’ve opened the case, enable the Custom Panel Dock by going to View > Custom Panel Dock, if it’s not already visible. Then, click Import custom panel at the bottom right of the interface (highlighted in red in Figure 3) and select custom_automation.cpn from the case directory to load the drill bit custom panel.
If you’re curious about building a custom panel for your workflow, or you’d like guidance on getting started in CONVERGE Studio, feel free to reach out! We’d be glad to discuss your use case and help you optimize your simulation process.
