PEM Material Database

Use of Altair Ziegler SnR Material Database.

The choice of suitable material pairs can avoid unexpected and undesirable noises occurring in products, as the phenomena can usually be traced back to the incompatibility of materials causing a stick-slip effect. An experience reinforced with over ten years of numerous research projects, ZIEGLER Instruments commands a wealth of know-how of such material pairs. The company has collected this knowledge into its leading Precise Expert Materials (PEM) database which consists of over 11,000 individual measurements and incorporates many of the common materials in the marketplace, all designed to help manufacturers to choose material pairs. The database is ideal for organizations that design products where unwanted noise can negatively affect customer satisfaction.

Altair and ZIEGLER have collaborated to enhance this Stick-Slip Material Database offering through the development of a user-friendly web portal that adds significant data exploration capabilities. This includes the ability to filter data using different criteria, the saving of favorite searches for easy re-access, comparison capabilities between materials using tables and visuals, and more.

Launch PEM Web Portal

Execute the materialSnR.exe for Windows or materialSnR on Linux. Executables are present in the following locations:
  • Windows: <HyperWorks Installation Path>\<HyperWorks Installation Path>\hwdesktop\hw\bin\win64\materialsnr.exe
  • Linux: <HyperWorks Installation Path>\<HyperWorks Installation Path>\hwdesktop\hw\bin\linux64\materialsnr.exe
This launches a command prompt to verify the license and initiate the connection to database.


Figure 1.
Once the connection is established, the web portal will open on the default web browser on the machine. Below is the landing page for it.


Figure 2.

PEM Portal Home Page

On PEM Portal Homepage you can select which material pairs to include in investigation either by creating a new search or selecting a previously saved search.

Search Material Pairs

The material pair search can be approached in two ways:

  1. Select required Material, Manufacturer and Brand under Part 1 and Part 2 sections and click Search.

    This searches the material pairs in the database based on the applied search filters.

  2. Select any one of the criteria either under Part 1 or Part 2 sections and click Search.

    This searches for all the possible material pair combination available for the selected criteria.

    Reset button can be used to reset the selection in all lists.

Saved Search

If a search has been saved in a previous session, it will be visible here. Select the required search you want to review again.

Results Page

Results Page provides an overview of the compatibility of the selected material pairs. It allows you to identify which material pair have a high risk of squeak and which do not.


Figure 3.
Below colors are assigned to each material pair-
  • Green- Low risk of Squeak
  • Red- High risk of Squeak
  • Medium- Relatively lower risk than Red.


    Figure 4.

From the Results Page you can:

Review Details of Material Pair
Click on individual material pair card to view more details.


Figure 5.
Refine Results

Use filter options to refine results. This is mainly used to find the material pairs that have poor compatibility to investigate further.

Set a Material Pair as favorite
Click star icon in the material pair card to mark it as a favorite. Favorite material pairs will be listed in the PEM Portal home page.


Figure 6.
Save Search
  1. Click Save Search.
  2. Enter a title for the search and click Save.


    Figure 7.
    Saved searches are accessible from PEM Portal home page. Each PEM session is bound to your machine MAC ID and will be saved in session.


    Figure 8.
Compare Results
Compare enables you to select material pair cards for comparison. You can compare up to four material pairs.


Figure 9.
Click Compare to select materials. Click Compare Results. This launches the comparison chart containing parameters for the selected pairs.


Figure 10.