Meshing an interior plastic component of a side door in a car using ANSA

Objective

• Take the mid-surface of the interior plastic component of a side door manually, mesh the geometry with quality.
• Take auto mid-surface and mesh the geometry with quality.
• Use the combination of both auto mid-surface and manually mid-surface and then mesh the geometry with quality.

                                       CASE 1. DOOR-TRIM MID SURFACE (MANUAL)

• The above image is the door inner plastic panel, in this project we have to create a middle surface from it and then mesh it. But first, we have to check the geometry for errors and rectify it.

Geometry check

Mid surface

• Now we will create the mid surface of the door plastic inner panel and then mesh it. We will do this by three methods, Auto method, Manual method and mix of both the methods.
• First, we will create the mid surface by manual method. To do this we can use the middle option in the faces menu for small parts and for large continuous surfaces we can use offset option in the faces menu.
• We have to use the necessary tools to create the middle surface one by one for all the entities in the geometry. Once we have created all the middle surfaces, we will get the final result as shown below.

PID

• Now we will mesh the middle surface. Before meshing the surface we have to set the meshing parameters and mesh quality criteria. Below are the images for mesh parameters and mesh quality criteria.

Mesh parameters

Mesh quality criteria

• For meshing, we are using "best" meshing option in the mesh module.
• After meshing we will get the final result as shown below.

Mesh Errors

• in the above image, we can see that many surface mesh elements are out of the mesh quality criteria.
• We have to remove all the errors by using suitable tools available in ANSA.

• In the above image, we can see that there are no remaining OFF elements.

Surface mesh checks

                                 CASE 2. DOOR-TRIM MID SURFACE (AUTO & MANUAL)

• Now we will use the same door inner panel to create the mid surface by auto and manual process. For large and simple entities we can use auto mid surface generation option in the faces menu. But for complex parts, we can use the manual method. The use of both methods will save time in creating the mid surface.

Mid surface

• The mid surface shown below is created by the auto method.
• The auto mid surface generation will generate the mesh elements but we can get the required surface from the mesh elements by using the "to surface" option in the elements menu in the mesh module.

• The mid surfaces for the remaining entities are created by manual method.

PID

Meshing

• We will use the same mesh parameters and mesh quality criteria for mesh generation.
• After meshing we will get the final result as shown below.

Mesh Errors

• in the above image, we can see that many surface mesh elements are out of the mesh quality criteria.
• We have to remove all the errors by using suitable tools available in ANSA.

• In the above image, we can see that there are no remaining OFF elements.

Surface mesh checks

                                            CASE 3. DOOR-TRIM MID SURFACE (AUTO)

• Now we will use the same door inner panel to create the mid surface by entirely by the auto process. This method is the fastest for creating mid surface, but it has some downsides too. The mid surface created entirely by the auto method has some issues, it does not create the mid surface properly for the complex geometries.
• To create the mid surface by auto method, select Mid surface option in the faces menu.

Mid surface

• The auto mid surface generation creates the mesh automatically. We can create the mid surface from the mesh elements by using to surface option in the elements menu in the mesh module.

PID

Meshing

• We will use the same mesh parameters and mesh quality criteria for mesh generation.
• After meshing we will get the final result as shown below.

Mesh Errors

• in the above image, we can see that many surface mesh elements are out of the mesh quality criteria.
• We have to remove all the errors by using suitable tools available in ANSA.

• In the above image, we can see that there are no remaining OFF elements.

Surface mesh checks

CONCLUSION

• In this project, the mid surface for the car door inner panel was generated by three different strategies, namely Manual, Auto & Manual, and Auto method.
• Among the three different techniques, most accurate in generating mid surface was the Manual technique. 
• The fasted method was the Auto method but the mid surface generated was not completely similar to the parent surface, especially for the complicated geometries.