Enhanced prediction of thermomechanical systems using machine learning, PCA, and finite element simulation

Abstract

This research paper presents a comprehensive methodology for analyzing wet clutches, focusing on their intricate thermomechanical behavior. The study combines advanced encoding techniques, such as Principal Component Analysis (PCA), with metamodeling, to efficiently predict pressure and temperature distributions on friction surfaces. By parametrically varying input parameters and utilizing Finite Element Method (FEM) simulations, we generate a dataset comprising 200 simulations, divided into training and testing sets. Our findings indicate that PCA encoding effectively reduces data dimensionality while preserving essential information. Notably, the study reveals that only a few PCA components are required for accurate encoding: two components for temperature distribution and pressure, and three components for heat flux density. We compare various metamodeling techniques, including Linear Regression, Decision Trees, Random Forest, Support Vector Regression, Gaussian Processes, and Neural Networks. The results underscore the varying performance of these techniques, with Random Forest excelling in mechanical metamodeling and Neural Networks demonstrating superiority in thermal metamodeling.