Richard (Ay),

After reading the well-written article referenced above, and realizing you were one of John's editors, I was a bit surprised by the apparent difference of opinion on this matter. However, after consulting with John, I realized the "correct" analysis is to leave the support in to capture thermal stresses AND create a seperate file without the support to check the sustained stress. If my understanding is correct, maybe the chasm isn't so wide or deep.

My next question is, if the support is removed for the thermal analysis, would this yield overly conservative results? Or would they be severly underestimated?