In preparing CAD models for effective modeling, I have made the following I have found the following to be useful:
1) Importing to COMSOL as solids only
2) Ticking the three boxes for repair options in the CAD import window
3) Adjustment of the CAD import tolerance (although I welcome suggestions of science behind this adjustment - thus far I have found no general trend)
4) Use of the repair function selecting all parts of the CAD (incidentally, is there a way to automatically select all parts of the CAD?) and adjusting the tolerance of repair. Similarly to the import tolerance I welcome suggestion as to a procedure to appropriately choose the size.
5) Use of repair functions in Spaceclaim. Although I have not yet found a consistent approach which works reliably. And in some cases I find that Spaceclaim, by performing one repair operation causes other problems - similar to a dog chasing its tail.
6) Virtual operations in COMSOL - ignoring edges etc. I find can sometimes help, though again I have no reliable procedure.
7) The use of extreme variation in mesh size. With smallest mesh size set to similar to the import tolerance and a rate of growth of 50 or more, has facilitated apprently unmeshable geometries in some cases.
The essential question I have is really, does anyone have a consistent method incoproating Spaceclaim, Solidworks and COMSOL to reliably and efficiently generate successful meshes from complex CAD models which are classed as "okay" by Solidworks, yet are problematic to mesh?
1) Importing to COMSOL as solids only
2) Ticking the three boxes for repair options in the CAD import window
3) Adjustment of the CAD import tolerance (although I welcome suggestions of science behind this adjustment - thus far I have found no general trend)
4) Use of the repair function selecting all parts of the CAD (incidentally, is there a way to automatically select all parts of the CAD?) and adjusting the tolerance of repair. Similarly to the import tolerance I welcome suggestion as to a procedure to appropriately choose the size.
5) Use of repair functions in Spaceclaim. Although I have not yet found a consistent approach which works reliably. And in some cases I find that Spaceclaim, by performing one repair operation causes other problems - similar to a dog chasing its tail.
6) Virtual operations in COMSOL - ignoring edges etc. I find can sometimes help, though again I have no reliable procedure.
7) The use of extreme variation in mesh size. With smallest mesh size set to similar to the import tolerance and a rate of growth of 50 or more, has facilitated apprently unmeshable geometries in some cases.
The essential question I have is really, does anyone have a consistent method incoproating Spaceclaim, Solidworks and COMSOL to reliably and efficiently generate successful meshes from complex CAD models which are classed as "okay" by Solidworks, yet are problematic to mesh?