In general , the basic platform and tools for Meshing task is common in all FEA pre-processing softwares like NX Nastran, Hypermesh,Cosmol, Abaqus, Ansys etc. This article will give a brief overview of the basic of mesh generation technique in FEA.
Defining and Generating a Mesh
The Meshing task will provide tools to help us to define and generate a FE mesh. We can
- use the geometry checking tools to verify that your geometry is ready for meshing
- define parameters for the mesh
- preview the mesh before you generate nodes and elements
- generate the mesh based on the mesh parameters
- check the quality of the mesh
- update the mesh after solution
- modify individual nodes and elements as necessary
Defining a Mesh
When we define a mesh, we should specify parameters such as:
- mesh type. Mesh generation can produce either regularly-spaced finite elements (mapped mesh) or less restrictive free elements (free mesh).
- element type and length
- elements' physical and material properties
- We can always choose default or previously-defined settings when you create a mesh. Often, however, you will want to control the meshing process more by changing some of the default parameters
Meshing Limitations
• We can't mesh adjacent entities with a different element order defined. For example, we cannot define a linear element type (say four node element) for a mesh on one surface (x) and then define a parabolic element type ( say eight node element) for an adjacent surface (y). This creates a mismatched element order where the surfaces join (z).
• We can't mesh adjacent entities that have a free and a mapped mesh defined on them.