Topology Optimizer
Topology optimization is how engineers let the computer design a part: you give it a design space, the supports and the loads, and a budget of material, and it works out where that material does the most good. This tool runs the classic SIMP method in your browser — a full plane-stress finite-element model of the part is solved every iteration with a banded Cholesky factorization, sensitivities are smoothed by a density filter, and optimality-criteria updates move material toward the elements that carry the most load. Watch bone-like trusses emerge from a gray block, paint your own holes, solid regions, supports and load arrows, switch to the stress or deformed view, check real-world stress, deflection and mass for PLA, aluminium or steel, and download the result as an SVG outline for laser cutting or an STL for 3D printing.
Runs 100% in your browser — simulations are computed locally on your device.
Notes
- The algorithm is a faithful port of "top88" (Andreassen et al., 2011), the 88-line MATLAB code used in teaching: densities are penalized as E = x³·E₀ (SIMP), so half-filled gray material is uneconomical and the design is pushed toward solid-or-void.
- It minimizes compliance, the work done by the loads, which is the same as maximizing stiffness. The volume budget is a hard constraint enforced every iteration by bisection on its Lagrange multiplier.
- The filter radius sets the smallest member thickness. Without a filter the problem is ill-posed and produces checkerboard patterns that depend on the mesh.
- Results are 2D plane-stress optima for linear-elastic material and a single load case; real designs also need checks for buckling, fatigue and manufacturing constraints.
- Runs 100% in your browser — simulations are computed locally on your device.
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