Enclosure

Does a polycarbonate shell survive a thumb press, and how far does it dent?

You ask

Does the PC shell survive a 120 N thumb press, and how far does the top dent?

Wobbl runs

Terminal
$ wobbl run enclosure.py -m pc --fix "z=min" \  --load "120 N down @ top and within 8 of 25,15,28" --budget 600

Checks

  • passmesh convergence
  • passforce balance
  • warnsingularities
  • passunits and sanity
Stress heatmap. Peak 8.77 MPa on face 29 at (23.8, 12.8, 25), safety factor 7.07 against yield (target 2). Confidence is medium.

HOLDSPeak 8.77 MPa on face 29 at (23.8, 12.8, 25), safety factor 7.07 against yield (target 2). Confidence is medium.

Peak stress
8.77 MPa
Safety factor
7.07
Target
2
Confidence
medium

Suggested fixes

  • Round the sharp inside corner to a 1.5 mm radius
  • Switch to PLA (3D printed)
summary.txt
summary.txt
HOLDS. Peak 8.77 MPa on face 29 at (23.8, 12.8, 25), safety factor 7.07 against yield (target 2). Confidence is medium. Confidence: medium. singularities: excluded from the answer: 20.6 MPa at a sharp inside corner (the 7 mm boss (face 35)) (a sharp corner: singular in theory, so the value depends on the mesh: 15.2 -> 20.8 -> 20.6 MPa); 18.2 MPa at a sharp inside corner (face 29) (a sharp corner: singular in theory, so the value depends on the mesh: 13.1 -> 18 -> 18.2 MPa); 9.85 MPa at a sharp inside corner (face 21) (a sharp corner: singular in theory, so the value depends on the mesh: 9.33 -> 9.55 -> 9.85 MPa). Wobbl reports the stress 2 mm or more away from these spotsMax deflection 0.217 mm at (21.4, 10.1, 26.8).Material Polycarbonate, limit 62 MPa; mass 48.55 g.Loads: 120 N down @ top and within 8 of 25,15,28. Fixtures: fixed z=min. Checks:  [pass] mesh convergence: von Mises stress settled: 8.67 -> 8.82 -> 8.77 MPa over 3 meshes, last change 0.6%  [pass] force balance: reactions balance the loads to 1.7e-05% (forces) and 3.6e-06% (moments)  [skip] hand calculation: no simple beam model applies (the governing point is not between the fixtures and the load, so no single section carries it)  [warn] singularities: excluded from the answer: 20.6 MPa at a sharp inside corner (the 7 mm boss (face 35)) (a sharp corner: singular in theory, so the value depends on the mesh: 15.2 -> 20.8 -> 20.6 MPa); 18.2 MPa at a sharp inside corner (face 29) (a sharp corner: singular in theory, so the value depends on the mesh: 13.1 -> 18 -> 18.2 MPa); 9.85 MPa at a sharp inside corner (face 21) (a sharp corner: singular in theory, so the value depends on the mesh: 9.33 -> 9.55 -> 9.85 MPa). Wobbl reports the stress 2 mm or more away from these spots  [pass] units and sanity: part 112 mm across, peak strain 0.0037, max deflection 0.217 mm (0.19% of size): all plausible Assumptions:  - Linear elastic material and small deflections (no yielding redistribution, no buckling).  - Polycarbonate: E 2350 MPa, Poisson 0.37, von Mises vs yield 62 MPa (Covestro Makrolon 2405 datasheet).  - Loads are static and applied all at once; no impact, vibration or fatigue.  - Molded part treated as isotropic and uniform; weld lines and the area near the gate can be weaker than the datasheet.  - Fixed faces are perfectly rigid; real mounts flex a little, which lowers peak stress next to them.  - Contact between separate parts, friction and preload are not modeled. Suggested fixes:  - Stress piles up in the sharp inside corner. A fillet of 1.5 mm (about half the 3 mm wall) spreads it out.  - Stress stays about the same for the same shape and load, so PLA (3D printed) (50 MPa) gives safety factor 5.70. It is 1.5x as stiff, so deflection scales by 0.671. Other options: PETG (3D printed) (5.36), ABS (3D printed) (3.76). Images: stress: images/stress.png, zoom: images/zoom.png, safety: images/safety.png, deformed: images/deformed.png, convergence: images/convergence.pngReport: report.html

Open the full report

About this example

This is the top shell of a handheld device, 90 x 60 x 28 mm with 3 mm walls and four screw bosses, held at its rim. A thumb presses 120 N on a 16 mm patch near one corner.

Result Value
Peak stress away from sharp corners 8.77 MPa on the top skin under the press, safety factor 7.1 against PC’s 62 MPa yield
Dent under the thumb 0.22 mm
Mesh convergence 8.67, 8.82, 8.77 MPa over three meshes (114k to 166k nodes)
Equilibrium reactions balance the 120 N to 0.00002%

Confidence is medium because the bosses meet the underside of the top with no fillet, and Wobbl flags those sharp corners as singular. One boss root reads 15.2, 20.8 and 20.6 MPa over the three meshes, a value the mesh sets rather than the part. The shell holds this press with a wide margin either way, but a 0.5 to 1 mm fillet at the boss roots is the cheap change that makes the corner stress finite and trustworthy.

Thin walls on a box need over 100k nodes per mesh, so the study takes about four and a half minutes on a 2018 six core laptop.

Run it yourself

Terminal
$ git clone https://github.com/sohan-bhat/wobbl$ cd wobbl/examples/enclosure && ./run.sh

The part, the script and every output are in examples/enclosure on GitHub.