Efficient tetrahedral remeshing of feature models for finite element analysis

Abstract

Finite element analysis is nowadays widely used for product testing. At various moments during the design phase, aspects of the physical behaviour of the product are simulated by performing an analysis of the model. For each analysis, a mesh needs to be created that represents the geometry of the model at that point. In particular during the later stages of the development cycle, often only minor modifications are made to a model between design iterations. In that case it can be beneficial to reuse part of the previous mesh, especially if it was costly to construct. A new method is presented that efficiently constructs a tetrahedral mesh based on a tetrahedral mesh of a feature model at an earlier point of the design cycle. This is done by analysing the difference of the two feature models from the point of view of the individual features. By this means we can find a natural correspondence between the geometries of the feature models, and relate this to the mesh of the earlier model. We discuss the algorithm, gained improvements, quality of the results, and conditions for this method to be effective.

Simulation of metallic powder bed additive manufacturing processes with the finite element method: A critical review

“…55 Furthermore, the mesh quality has a remarkable impact on the computational efficiency of the simulation and the time required for the analysis. 56,57 A popular technique among AM simulation studies is using mesh density which varies across different regions of the model. Certain regions, particularly those close to the heat source, exhibit steep temperature gradients and an accurate analysis would require a more dense mesh in those areas.…”

Identifying Different Entities for Minor Model Modification Based on Common Primary Subpart

“…Cellular Model: Some researches identify local modifications based on cellular model [5,6], where the cellular model keeps the track of each feature modification in the design iteration process. However, applying these approaches directly on B-rep models is not trivial, as feature information should be recognized in advance, which however is not an easy task [16].…”

The geometric element transformation method for tetrahedral mesh smoothing

“…In addition, specialized algorithms exist, for example, in order to efficiently remesh feature models [9]. Within this context, mesh improvement methods play an important role, since in many cases they are incorporated into the mesh generation process or used as a post-processing step.…”