LOGIN (/USER/LOGIN) CART (/CART) Search...

Engineering ANSYS Software Resource ANSYS About News & Contact

Consulting & Support Library Training Us Insights Us
(/engineering- (/ansys-software- (/resources) (/ansys- (/about- (/news- (/contact-
(/) consulting) support) training) us) insights) us)

you are here: (/) / News & Insights (/news-insights) / Engineering Advantage Blog (/blog) / Adopting Adaptive Meshing

Engineering Advantage Subscribe to Our Blog via Email:

SUBSCRIBE ME!

Adopting Adaptive Meshing

Related Posts:

(/blog/structural-thermal-and-cfd-simulation-
medical-devices)

(http://www.linkedin.com/shareArticle?
(http://twitter.com/intent/tweet?
(http://www.facebook.com/share.php?

mini=true&url=caeai.com//blog/adopting-
status=Adopting
u=caeai.com//blog/adopting-
August 16, 2017
adaptive-(https://plus.google.com/share?
Adaptiveadaptive-

meshing&title=Adopting meshing&title=Adopting by: Chris Mesibov

url=caeai.com//blog/adopting-
Meshing+caeai.com//blog/adopting-

Adaptiveadaptive-adaptive-Adaptive(/blog-
Structural, Thermal and CFD
September 13, 2016 By: Michael Bak Share: Meshing)
meshing)
meshing)
Meshing)
rss)
Simulation for Medical Devices
(/blog/structural-thermal-and-cfd-
If you perform nonlinear structural finite element analyses with large displacements, then you simulation-medical-devices)
are probably very familiar with the element has become highly distorted, or similar, warning
message. This warning indicates that due to excessive deflections, the shape of the elements READ MORE (/BLOG/STRUCTURAL-THERMAL-AND-CFD-
in the mesh have significantly changed from their original shape, and this distortion is SIMULATION-MEDICAL-DEVICES)

reducing simulation accuracy and causing convergence issues, eventually leading to analysis
termination. This behavior is common when modeling soft materials like rubber, simulations of TAGS: medical product development (/blog?
metal forming, or when elements accumulate plasticity, creep, damage, or even cracking tid_1=medical product development) / FEA Consulting

simulations. A simple example of a highly distorted mesh due to excessive deformation is (/blog?tid=66) / CFD (/blog?tid=80) / CFD Consulting
(/blog?tid=81) / Engineering Analysis Tips (/blog?tid=28)
shown in Figure 1.
/ FEA (/blog?tid=65) / ANSYS (/blog?tid=79)

Figure 1: Highly Distorted Mesh in Metal Forming Model

(/blog/simulation-benefits-healthcare-industry-
This situation is especially frustrating, since it typically takes a lot of time and effort to create electrical-medical-devices)
a well-shaped mesh in complex parts, and yet your original awesome mesh ends up distorted,
and the analysis often errors out before completion. So, its back to the drawing board,
perhaps starting over with trying to create a mesh with element shapes that might anticipate
the upcoming distortion. Wouldnt it be nice if finite element codes could just adjust the mesh August 8, 2017
on the fly during the analysis to keep the elements from distorting too much? by: Chris Mesibov

Finite element codes with mesh nonlinear adaptivity features will automatically modify the Simulation Benefits For The
mesh according to specified criteria during solution, requiring no user-intervention. There are
Healthcare Industry - Electrical
Medical Devices
typically two different approaches for modifying the mesh: (/blog/simulation-benefits-
healthcare-industry-electrical-
medical-devices)
1. Element splitting with morphing.
2. General remeshing. READ MORE (/BLOG/SIMULATION-BENEFITS-HEALTHCARE-
INDUSTRY-ELECTRICAL-MEDICAL-DEVICES)

Element splitting is performed by simply dividing the original elements into elements having
some fraction of the edge length of the original elements. This type of mesh refinement is TAGS: healthcare (/blog?tid_1=healthcare) /

typically not used to repair a distorted mesh, but is more commonly used to improve solution Electromagnetics (/blog?tid=303) / FEA Consulting
(/blog?tid=66) / CFD (/blog?tid=80) / CFD Consulting
accuracy and capture local behavior in more detail. An example of mesh adaptivity applied to
(/blog?tid=81) / FEA (/blog?tid=65)
the modeling of rubber is illustrated in a previous blog (/blog/tips-tricks-fea-modeling-rubber-and-
elastomers-part-2) . In some cases, element splitting is followed by morphing to try to improve the
element shapes. Examples include local necking, local buckling, and high stress
concentrations. Figure 2 shows an example of a crack simulation where the mesh is split to
obtain a finer mesh in the region near the crack tip.

Figure 2: Element Splitting Near Crack Tip

(/blog/simulation-benefits-healthcare-industry-
fda-approval)

August 1, 2017
by: Chris Mesibov

Simulation Benefits For The

General remeshing is performed by completely eliminating the existing mesh in the selected Healthcare Industry - FDA
region, and then creating an entirely new mesh to improve quality. This technique is Approval (/blog/simulation-
preferred when element distortion is causing convergence issues. An example is shown in benefits-healthcare-industry-fda-
Figure 3, showing the same model in Figure 1 employing adaptive meshing using the general approval)
remeshing approach.
READ MORE (/BLOG/SIMULATION-BENEFITS-HEALTHCARE-
INDUSTRY-FDA-APPROVAL)

Figure 3: General Remeshing of Metal Forming Model

TAGS: healthcare (/blog?tid_1=healthcare) / simulation
driven product development (/blog?tid_1=simulation
driven product development) / FDA approval (/blog?
tid_1=FDA approval) / Electromagnetics (/blog?tid=303) /
FEA Consulting (/blog?tid=66) / CFD (/blog?tid=80) /
CFD Consulting (/blog?tid=81) / FEA (/blog?tid=65) /
ANSYS (/blog?tid=79)

There can be several different criteria that govern how, when, and where the mesh is updated
in an adaptive meshing application. For example, in ANSYS, the four main criteria are:

1. Energy-based.
2. Position-based.
3. Contact-based.
4. Mesh-quality based.
(/blog/simulation-benefits-healthcare-industry-
part-1)
Energy-based criteria track the magnitude of the strain energy to determine when element
splitting should occur. This approach is used to refine meshes to achieve better accuracy in
regions of high stress concentrations. Position-based criteria are used in cases of very large
deformations where it is not known initially which elements should be remeshed, such as may
July 25, 2017
be the case for a rubber seal. A region in global coordinate space is identified, and any
by: Chris Mesibov
element that falls within that region is included in the adaptive meshing. Contact-based
criteria use mesh adaptivity to split contact elements based on the specified number of Simulation Benefits For The
contacting elements to ensure accurate results at contact interfaces. This approach could Healthcare Industry - Part 1
(/blog/simulation-benefits-
automatically ensure a fine mesh in a contact region as discussed in a previous blog on
healthcare-industry-part-1)
obtaining accurate contact stresses (/blog/my-contact-stress-real) . These three criteria all typically
use the element splitting technique.
Mesh-quality criteria base the remeshing on the elements maximum corner angle or the
element skewness. General remeshing is necessary to perform adaptive meshing for these READ MORE (/BLOG/SIMULATION-BENEFITS-HEALTHCARE-
INDUSTRY-PART-1)
cases.

There are significant challenges to incorporating and performing nonlinear adaptive meshing. TAGS: healthcare (/blog?tid_1=healthcare) / medical

Since the application is a nonlinear analysis, the element stiffness matrices are not constant product development (/blog?tid_1=medical product
development) / Electromagnetics (/blog?tid=303) / FEA
as in a linear elastic problem, so in addition to creating the new mesh, the updated stiffness
Consulting (/blog?tid=66) / CFD (/blog?tid=80) / CFD
characteristics and previous load/stress/strain history must be mapped from the previous to
Consulting (/blog?tid=81) / FEA (/blog?tid=65)
the new mesh. At each point in the analysis where remeshing occurs, a restart is required
since the analysis has been interrupted. And, as is the case with any finite element
procedure, the adaptive meshing settings, such as the input values for the various criteria, as
well as the frequency and location for remeshing, may not provide an acceptable and
successful solution without some tweaking or iterating on the input quantities.

Post-processing is also more difficult since each time adaptive meshing is performed, a new
mesh is used, and thus nodal results cannot be tracked from the start of the analysis. In
some codes such as LS-DYNA, different result files are generated for each mesh. In other
codes, like ANSYS, one result file is maintained, but displacements represent those from the
start of each new mesh.
(/blog/tips-tricks-matching-fea-results-physical-
data)
However, even though nonlinear adaptive meshing is not foolproof, it can still be used to
obtain more accurate results, and can even get hard-to-converge problems to complete, for
many cases. A recent example is an analysis of a metal forming billet problem that we use in
some of our nonlinear finite element training courses. A rectangular billet is compressed
July 18, 2017
using a rigid die, resulting in plastic strains in excess of 90%. Without adaptive meshing, it is by: Peter Barrett
very difficult to get a complete solution, and even partially-solved solutions can generate very
different results based on minor changes to the analysis settings, due to distorted elements Tips & Tricks for Matching FEA
forming under the die. Activating mesh-quality based nonlinear adaptive meshing generates a
Results to Physical Data
(/blog/tips-tricks-matching-fea-
complete solution with a well-shaped mesh throughout, as shown in the animation in Figure 4.
results-physical-data)

READ MORE (/BLOG/TIPS-TRICKS-MATCHING-FEA-

Figure 4: Animation of Metal Forming Analysis with Mesh-Quality Based
RESULTS-PHYSICAL-DATA)
Adaptive Meshing

TAGS: test data (/blog?tid_1=test data) / FEA

Consulting (/blog?tid=66) / Engineering Analysis Tips
(/blog?tid=28) / FEA (/blog?tid=65)

Do you use nonlinear adaptive meshing in any of your applications? If so, please share your
experiences in the comments.
1 Comment CAE Associates
1 Login

Sort by Best
Recommend Share

Join the discussion

LOG IN WITH
OR SIGN UP WITH DISQUS ?

Name

Ren Kubk a year ago

I actually found it useless for my application. Tried to simulate the Clinching joining
process of two thin steel sheets in 2D axisymmetric terms. Simulation crashes in two
fashions: undetected contact between lower sheet and die - it completely flew through
(but at least some splitting operations are done), second fashion - crashes when
remeshing should occur. I read in the documentation that a lot of restrictions are present
for utilization of nonlinear adaptive meshing. That are my experiences (bad).
Reply Share

Subscribe d Add Disqus to your siteAdd DisqusAdd Privacy

Contact Us (/contact-us)
Privacy Policy (/about-us/privacy-policy) Sitemap (/sitemap) 2017 CAE Associates Inc. All rights reserved (/) (http://www.linkedin.com/comp
aided-
engineering-
associates-
inc.?
(/feed)
(https://plus.google.com/b/10735181
trk=company_logo)
(http://www.youtube.com
(http://www.twitter.c
(http://www.fac