Ahmad compared the process to an old family recipe having reached perfection through the process of generations of people making mistakes. Their numerical simulations also showed that the actual cure takes place during a relatively short time, whereas the entire process takes more than 300 minutes. Because the critical stage is brief, the simulation had to be sufficiently detailed to account for rapid changes in the curing process. Both of these undesirable conditions can result in structural failure of the product. Today, curing tests can be simulated on supercomputers in a relatively short time when compared with laboratory test times.
Simulations also save on the costly materials consumed in a laboratory.
Physical tests must still be performed, but less often, with their role trimmed to determining material properties and validating computer simulations. Aside from saving time and money, the simulations also allow scientists to use helpful but complex mathematical methods, such as finite element analysis, that would be almost impossible to use efficiently without parallel processing. This method enables scientists to calculate temperatures, pressures and displacements in thousands of composite sites at the same time. Also, the simulations can provide scientists with information that is difficult to obtain from actual tests, such as internal stresses in a composite. Other members of the structural and solid mechanics group include Sung Yi, senior lecturer in mechanical engineering at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University, Harry H. Hilton, professor of aeronautical and astronautical engineering, and postdoctoral research fellows Harrison Poon and Cristina Beldica.