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Introduction To Meshing

This document provides an introduction to meshing, including: 1. Defining what meshing is and its importance in engineering simulation. 2. Explaining the differences between structured and unstructured meshes, and when each is appropriate. 3. Describing common 2D and 3D element types including triangles, quads, tetrahedrons and hexes. 4. Outlining several meshing methods like automatic, sweep, and tetrahedral that can be used to mesh different geometry types.

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Mostafa Mahmood
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88 views

Introduction To Meshing

This document provides an introduction to meshing, including: 1. Defining what meshing is and its importance in engineering simulation. 2. Explaining the differences between structured and unstructured meshes, and when each is appropriate. 3. Describing common 2D and 3D element types including triangles, quads, tetrahedrons and hexes. 4. Outlining several meshing methods like automatic, sweep, and tetrahedral that can be used to mesh different geometry types.

Uploaded by

Mostafa Mahmood
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Introduction to Meshing

Prepared By:
Mostafa Mahmood
Session objectives:-
• After this session you should be able to:-
1. Learn what is mesh.
2. Difference between structured & unstructured mesh and when to use each.
3. Mesh element types for 3D and 2D.
4. Learn and be able to apply different meshing methods.
What is Mesh?

• Meshing is an integral part of the engineering simulation process


where complex geometries are divided into simple elements that
can be used as discrete local approximations of the larger domain.
• The mesh influences the accuracy, convergence and speed of the
simulation
Structured vs Unstructured Mesh

• Structured meshes are meshes with implicit • Unstructured meshes are meshes with general
connectivity whose structure allows for easy connectivity (GCON) whose structure is random and
identification of elements and nodes. Often structured therefore the connectivity of elements must be
meshes have orthogonal quadrilateral (2D) or defined and stored. GCON element types are non-
hexahedral (3D) elements. orthogonal, such as triangles (2D) and tetrahedra (3D)
• Structured meshes allow programmers to enumerate • Unstructured meshes require programmers to map
the nodes in such a way that any adjacent elements or more data to each node, such as adjacency lists and
nodes can be called upon without knowing any coordinate lists.
connectivity information. It is also possible to access
coordinates easily because the size of each element
does not vary element to element.
❖ When to use each mesh type?
To answer ask yourself:
• Do you have a complex geometry in which the geometric shape is key
to the design?
• Do you have localized regions of your model that require a higher
resolution mesh?
NO YES
Structured mesh advantages Unstructured mesh advantages

• Memory efficient. • Complex geometries easier to mesh.


• Fast to Solve. • Arbitrary positions.

Structured mesh disadvantages Unstructured mesh disadvantages

• Angled and curved geometries are • Greater memory requirement.


approximated (leads to stair • slower to solve.
stepping).
Mesh Types

2D elements 3D elements

tri Quad
Mesh Types
Tetra Mesh
Can be generated quickly, automatically, and for complicated geometry
Mesh Types
• Hex Mesh
• Fewer elements required to resolve physics for most CFD
applications
• This hexahedral mesh, which provides the same resolution of flow physics, has LESS
than half the amount of nodes as the Tet-mesh)
Meshing Methods for 2D geometry
• There are four different meshing methods in the ANSYS Meshing
Platform for 2D Geometry which can be applied to Surface Bodies or
Shells:
Automatic Method
Quadrilateral Dominant
All Triangles
Uniform Quad/Tri
Uniform Quad
Meshing Methods for 3D geometry
• There are five different meshing methods in the ANSYS Meshing
Application for 3D Geometry:
• – Automatic
• – Tetrahedrons
• Patch Conforming
• Patch Independent
• Sweep Meshing
• Multizone
• Hex dominant
• Cutcell for CFD ( not discussed)
Sweep Method
• Allows for inflation layer (boundary layer resolution) for CFD
• Produces Hexes and/or Prisms Body must be Sweepable
• Single Source, Single Target
• Inflation can yield pure hex or prisms
Tetrahedron method
• Generates tetrahedron elements which are capable of capturing the curvatures and hard geometric
details with good element quality.

• Patch Independent Tetra method: • Patch confirming Tetra method: boundaries


• mesh ignores small geometric details and wash between features (faces, edges & vertex) are
over them to create good quality elements respected and elements doesn’t cross over
independent of rough geometry. them.
• compatible with defeaturing (discussed later) • Better used for detailed and clean geometry
• Better used for dirty models where there's a lot where details are in regions of interest.
of small details specially in regions of
uninterest, to reduce element quantity and
escalate runtime
Tetrahedrons Method: Application
Examples

Patch Conforming Patch Independent


• Clean CAD, accurate surface • Dirty CAD, defeatured surface
mesh mesh
The Automatic method
• The Automatic setting toggles between Tetrahedral(Patch
Conforming) and Swept Meshing, Depending upon whether the body
is sweepable. Bodies in the same part will have a conformal mesh.
Multizone Sweep Mesh
• Automatic geometry decomposition
-With the swept method, this part would have to be sliced into 3
bodies to get a pure hex mesh
Hex dominant method
• The hex-dominant meshing algorithm creates a quad-dominant surface mesh
first, then hexahedral, pyramid and tetrahedral elements are filled in as
needed.
• Recommended when a hex mesh is desired for a body that cannot be swept
• Useful for bodies with large amounts of interior volume
• Not useful for thin complicated bodies where the ratio of volume to surface area is low
• No boundary layer resolution for CFD
• Mainly used for FEA analysis
Meshing Optimization
What is Meshing Optimiztion

The more no of elements The more accurate results you can get

UT
The more no of elements The more computational resources are needed

What isTarget?

High accuracy Low cost Fast solution

So, How to reach the same higher accuracy using smaller no. of element and lower in cost

2 Eng.M ohamed Soliman – A N S YS Design M odeler


Mesh requirments
• Considerations
• Detail:
• How much geometric detail is relevant to the simulation physics.
• Including unnecessary detail can greatly increase the effort
required for the simulation.

• Refinement
• Where in the domain are the most complex stress/flow gradients?
These areas will require higher densities of mesh elements.
Mesh Specification
• Efficiency
• Greater numbers of elements require more compute resource (memory /
processing time). Balance the fidelity of the simulation with available resources.
• Refine (smaller cells) for high solution gradients and fine geometric detail.
• Coarse mesh (larger cells) elsewhere.
Mesh Specification
• Quality
• In areas of high geometric complexity mesh elements can become
distorted. Poor quality elements can lead to poor quality results or,
in some cases, no results at all!
• There are a number of methods for measuring mesh element
quality (mesh metrics*). For example, one important metric is the
element ‘Skewness’. Skewness is a measure of the relative
distortion of an element compared to its ideal shape and is scaled
from
0 (Excellent) to 1 (Unacceptable).
Mesh Metric
• Displays Mesh Metrics graph for the element
quality distribution
• Different element types are plotted with
different color bars
• Can be accessed through menu bar using
Metric Graph button

• Click on bars to view corresponding elements


in the graphics window
– Use to help locate poor quality elements
Mesh Specification
Example showing difference between good and poor meshes:

This example illustrates an unconverged thermal field in a manifold solid casting. On closer inspection it is
clear that the simulation is unable to resolve a sensible data field in the region of poor quality elements.

The example with good quality elements demonstrates no problems in the solution field. The ANSYS
Meshing Application provides many tools to help maximize mesh quality

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