Topology optimization of a mountain bike disk brake rotor using Ansys Mechanical.

A few years ago I replaced the forks on my ancient mountain bike & subsequently required a new / larger front disc brake rotor as the mounting positions for the caliper had changed. The problem I faced was not having much money... & that it was very difficult to find a compatible rotor with my ancient but good Hope front Hub. Anyway a very kind machinist where I used to work said that he would make me a new rotor if I got him a design... He made the rotor & it works great still today.
Anyway having come across the design files the other day I thought I would use them to test the Ansys mechanical topology optimization tool.
I simulated the rotor I designed by clamping the hub mount points & applying a torque of 102Nm to the outer diameter as worst case scenario type of loading. The torque loading values I obtained from this interesting paper (lnkd.in/eBVTbcx) and applied a safety factor of 1.5 to the top torque recorded.
For the topology optimization i used the same loading scenario & created a filled body around the mounting points and just let the program work its magic. The goal of the optimization was to retain 20% of the mass (giving a similar resultant mass to the original) with a manufacturing cyclical constraint applied.
But the main point / the real goal of this was just to see what Ansys came up with as an optimised shape.
I am quite happy with the results and I have learned a few new tricks with this little project.

[@appa609]

I don't think the load case is representative. What actually happens is an assymetric tangential force applied on a small patch. This would be multiple load cases in the contect of this solver.