TOC

FEM Surface

Preface
Getting Started
Basic Tasks
Glossary
Index

© Dassault Systèmes 1994-99. All rights reserved.

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 Preface

Preface
CATIA - FEM Surface Version 5 Release 5 product allows you to rapidly generate a finite
element model for complex surface parts.
It provides users with automatic detail simplification without modifying the reference geometry.

Using This Guide

More Information

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 Using This Guide

Using This Guide

This book is intended for the user who needs to quickly become familiar with CATIA - FEM
Surface Version 5 Release 5. The user should be familiar with basic CATIA Version 5 concepts
such as document windows, standard and view toolbars.
To get the most out of this guide, we suggest you start reading and performing the step-by-step
tutorial "Getting Started". This tutorial will show you how to analyse a part from scratch.

The "Basic Tasks" section presents the main capabilities of the product. Each individual task is
carefully defined and explained in detail.
It may also be a good idea to take a look at the "Workbench Description" section, presenting
the menus and toolbars.
Finally, a "Glossary" has been provided to familiarise you with the terminology used in this
guide.

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 More Information

Where to Find More Information

Prior to reading this book, we recommend that you read the CATIA Version 5 Infrastructure
User's Guide.
CATIA - Part Design User's Guide may also prove useful.
And you should view the Conventions used in this guide.

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 Getting Started

Getting Started
The aim of the following tutorial is to give you an idea of what you can do with CATIA - FEM
Surface. It provides a step-by-step scenario demonstrating how to use key capabilities.

The main tasks proposed in this section are:

Entering the Workbench
Defining a New Mesh
Setting Constraints
Analysing Quality
Re-meshing a Domain

Altogether, this scenario should take about 15 minutes to complete.

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Entering the Workbench

Entering the FEM Surface Workbench

This task demonstrates how to open a part and enter the FEM Surface
Workbench.
Before starting this scenario, you should be familiar with the basic commands common to
all workbenches.
You can use the Sample01.CATPart document from the samples directory for this task.
1. Select File -> Open, and select the desired .CATPart file. This opens a Part Design
document containing the selected part.
2. Select Start -> Analysis & Simulation ->
Advanced Meshing Tools.
The New Analysis Case dialog box is
displayed.

3. Select an Analysis Case type (Static or

Frequency).
Optionally, you can activate the "Keep as
default starting analysis case" switch.
Click OK to enter the workbench.

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Defining a New Mesh

Defining a New Mesh

This task demonstrates how to define a new mesh and it's global parameters on a
single part.
1.
Click the Surface Mesh icon .
2. Select the geometry to be meshed
by clicking on the part.
3. In the Global parameters dialog box,
we define the mesh parameters.
In this example we:
set the Mesh size to 5 mm
set the Sag value to 1 mm
activate the Details
simplification
set the Minimum size to 2 mm

We leave the global method to

quadrangle.

4. Click the OK button.

A new Smart Surfacic Mesh entity is
created in the tree.

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Setting Constraints

Setting Constraints
This task demonstrates how to define constraints on nodes distributions.
1. Click the
Add/remove
constraints

icon

2. Select the
edge to be
constrained.

3. Click the Ok
button in the
Add/Remove
dialog box to
end the
constraints
definition.
At this
stage,
constraints
are kept in
the mesh
definition.

4. Click the
Nodes
distributions

icon .

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Setting Constraints

5. Select the
edge on
which a new
distribution
will be set.

6. In the Edit
node
distribution
dialog box
we define
the
parameters
of the new
distribution.
Select the
uniform
distribution
type and set
the number
of nodes to
10.
Click the Ok
button. The
nodes
distribution
is created on
the selected
edge.

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Setting Constraints

7. In the Node
distributions
dialog box,
click the Ok
button to
end the
distributions
definition.

At this
stage,
distributions
are kept in
the mesh
definition.

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Analysing Quality

Meshing and Analysing Quality

This task demonstrates how to generate the mesh and use some basic quality analysis
functionalities.

1.
Click the Mesh icon .
The mesh is generated on the part and a
little summary is provided in the Mesh
update dialog box.
The visualization is switched to quality
mode so the user can see the quality of
the generated mesh.

2.
Click the Quality Analysis icon .
The Quality Analysis dialog box lists the
available quality specifications for
visualizing the mesh. By selecting
particular specifications, the user can
decide how he wants to view the mesh. It
also provides a set of functionalities for
deeper analysis.
Quality Analysis functionalities are
available at all steps of the meshing
process.
See Quality Analysis for more detailed
information.

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Analysing Quality

3.
Click the Report icon .
The Quality Report dialog box presents statistics for the selected quality specifications.
Select the Mesh tab page to view mesh composition statistics.

4.
Click the Single Analysis icon .
You can select an element of the mesh
and obtain a detailed view of it's quality in
the Analyze Single pane.
This allows you to check if any of your
specifications have not been
implemented.

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Analysing Quality

5. Click OK in the Quality Analysis dialog

box to exit the Quality Analysis
environment.

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Re-meshing a Domain

Re-meshing a Domain

This task demonstrates how to re-mesh a domain with local specifications.

1.
Click the re-mesh icon

2. Select the domain to be

re-meshed, as shown in the
picture.
We will try to remove the
triangles by locally altering
the mesh method.

3. Set the parameters for the

selected domain.
To do this, you specify the:
mesh method
local size
impact to neighbour
domains.

For this example, we will

specify a mapped mesh and
a size of 5 mm.
And we specify that these
domain specifications can
affect neighbour domains.
See Local Re-meshing for
more detailed information.

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Re-meshing a Domain

4. Click OK to re-mesh the

domain. The mesh is
updated.
The domain is now meshed
with quadrangles only.

5.
To exit the meshing environment, click the exit icon .
This completes the FEM Surface tutorial. Now, let's take a closer look at the
application.

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 Basic Tasks

Basic Tasks
This section describes the basic tasks that allow you to complete the mesh of a part using
CATIA - FEM Surface. These tasks include:
Cleaning Geometry

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 Cleaning Geometry

Cleaning Geometry
Geometrical parts often present small holes or defects that should be ignored during the

analysis. The clean geometry command is intended to let the user specify which of these
details will be ignored by the mesher. It deals with three types of geometric problems:

Holes in the geometry.

Button hole - like gaps.

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Removing Holes

Removing Holes
This first task shows you how to ignore holes in the geometry.

You can use the Sample03.CATPart document from the samples directory for this task.
1.
Create a new Mesh on the part.
2. Click the Remove

Holes icon
The diameter
parameter is used
to ignore all holes
that are smaller
than the given
value.

3. Set the diameter

value to 10 mm and
click Apply.
See how the
ignored holes are
turned blue.

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Removing Holes

4. Click a green hole.

It is turned blue and
will then be ignored
by the mesher.

5. Click a blue hole.

It is reactivated and
will be taken into
account by the
mesher.

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Removing Button Hole Gaps

Removing Button Hole Gaps

This task demonstrates how to configure the mesher to ignore button hole gaps.

You can use the Sample02.CATPart document from the samples directory for this task.
1. Create a new
Mesh on the
part.
Button hole
gaps are
automatically
detected by the
program and
are displayed in
magenta on the
part.

2. Click the
Remove Holes

icon .
3. You can
configure the
mesher to
ignore button
hole gaps by
simply clicking
on the magenta
contours.
Now, they will
be ignored by
the mesher.
In fact, the
facing edges of
the gap will be
merged and the

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Removing Button Hole Gaps

result will be
considered as a
standard edge.

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Glossary

Glossary

C
crack A geometry defect that occurs when two adjacent faces, near the free edges,
are not topologically linked.

G
global size The target size for element edges.

M
minimum size Minimum size of an edge of an element. When the detail elimination option is
active, the mesher does not generate elements with edges shorter than the
minimum size.

P
part A 3D entity obtained by combining different features in the Part Design
workbench. Please see CATIA - Part Design User's Guide for further
information.

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 Index

Index
C
cleaning geometry

R
removing
holes
button hole gaps

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