Cable Connectors

You can use the cable connector to simulate cables, ropes, or chains in an assembly, which act either as supporting members or perform load lifting operations.

You can define the cable connector between solid surfaces, shell edges, or vertices (of solids or shells), or a combination of vertices to faces, vertices to circular edges, and circular edges to faces.

Cable connectors are tension-only elements that carry axial forces when subjected to tensile loading. The cable connector only becomes active when the distance between the two ends exceeds its initial or pretensioned length, at which point the cable develops tensile stresses and helps in supporting the structure.

The cable connector uses the distributed coupling formulation to connect a reference node, which is located at the end joints of the cable, to a group of coupling nodes of the selected face or edge. If you select a vertex, the cable is connected to a group of surrounding nodes within the area of influence. Distributing coupling constrains the motion of the coupling nodes to the translational motion of the reference node.

After running a simulation with cable connectors, you can list the connectors' forces, such as axial force and torque. Shear force and bending moment are not valid results, as the cable is designed for tension and does not have bending stiffness. Results are reported with respect to the cable's local coordinate system, which is defined from the first reference node to the second, based on the order of selection. The axial force might show a positive or negative value, depending on its direction relative to the connector's local axis. If a cable experiences compressive loads, the cable becomes slack and reports the axial force as zero.

The cable connector is supported for linear static studies and is available with SOLIDWORKS Simulation Professional and SOLIDWORKS Simulation Premium.