> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://dante-solutions-inc.gitbook.io/dante-6.3-help-documentation/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://dante-solutions-inc.gitbook.io/dante-6.3-help-documentation/introduction-2/mat-simulator.md).
# Mat Sim
The Mat Simulator utility is a powerful utility used to predict the hardness, volume phase fractions, and strain for a defined thermal process for a single point rather than a 2D or 3D geometry. The heating/quenching schedules can be applied as time-temperature tabular data, or rate-temperature-time tabular data.
## Use Case
The Mat Simulator utility is an FEA tool used to predict the strain, volume fraction, etc. for a specific point, based off of a thermal history.
For this example, we are going to use the 1020 material found inside the DANTE material database.
As for the heating and cooling schedule, we defined a rate of 5 oC/s to a target temperature of 950 oC and a cooling rate of -20 oC/s to a target temperature of 20 oC.
One input that can be adjusted depending on the material is the initial phase composition. For this analysis, the initial phase composition is 50% ferrite 50% pearlite. If the initial phase composition was 100% martensite, the strain will be affected, which will affect the final stress and distortion of the part.
Similar to some of the other utilities, Mat Simulator can also be used to adjust the phase transformation kinetics to personalize some of the default materials within the DANTE material database.
