Abaqus: How to Reduce the Size of your .stt file

Often .stt files can be larger than the .odb files. When you have a limited storage space it becomes important to try and reduce the size of your files. The way to do this is simple: increase the output frequency. This means that instead of writing the resulting data in every single time step to the .stt file only 1/5 or 1/20 or 1/1000 of the step data is written to the .stt file. I think this also makes the simulation run faster but I can not be sure. To reduce the frequency either specify when creating the output requests in Abaqus CAE or edit the input (.inp) file. Here is an example of how to reduce your output requests by editing the input file:

** OUTPUT REQUESTS

**

*Restart, write, frequency=25

**

** FIELD OUTPUT: F-Output-1

**

*Output, field, frequency=25

*Node Output

NT,

*Element Output, directions=YES

SDV,

*Output, history, frequency=25

The frequency could be reduced more or less until you are able to see the information you desire and have a reasonably sized .stt file. A higher frequency means fewer steps are output and your .stt file will be smaller. Also it is important to note that when viewing the time history results of a simulation that the beginning and end of every step will be show. That means that for a step that is ten seconds long you will be able to view the results of the simulation at 0.0 seconds and 10.0. That holds even if the output frequency is 1000.