Meshing Exercise

We will start with creating the solid model. You are to take the necessary steps up o this point. Choose your element type as 4node Quad . E = 30e6 psi and = 0.3)

Create the area

  1. Preprocessor
  2. Create
  3. Rectangle
  4. By Dimensions
  5. Enter (0,5) for (X1,X2)
  6. Enter (0,1) for (Y1,Y2)
  7. OK

Mesh the area

  1. Preprocessor
  2. Mesh
  3. Areas
  4. Pick the area you just created and hit OK


Notice that since we didn't specify element size and shape, ANSYS used its default values to generate the mesh. We want to use five elements, therefore we need to clean the mesh and regenerate it after specifying "Element shape and size"

Clear the area

  1. Preprocessor
  2. Clear
  3. Areas
  4. Pick the meshed area
  5. OK

Any time you delete items like elements, nodes, areas and try to create some more you will see that ANSYS doesn't number your entities starting from one (Some of may you have encountered this problem already). To tackle this problem we are going to introduce the concept of "Compressing the numbers". Essentially what it means is that we are forcing ANSYS to start numbering from the next available number.

Ex: Suppose you created 6 areas and for some reason deleted the last two. If you try to crate more areas, most probably next one will be numbered as 7 NOT 5. You will avoid this problem if you take advantage of the concept we are about to introduce.

Compressing the numbers

  1. Preprocessor
  2. Numbering Controls
  3. Compress Numbers …
  4. Choose ALL (Depending on what you are dealing with you can choose individual items as well)
  5. OK


Remesh the area

Set element shape

  1. Preprocessor
  2. Shape & size
  3. Element Shape
  4. Choose "QuadOnly | Brick"
  5. OK

Set element size

  1. Preprocessor
  2. Shape & Size
  3. For Picked Lines (NOT For All Lines because we want different number of division for different lines (i.e. 5 for horizontal lines 1 for vertical lines)
  4. Pick two horizontal lines (lines 1 and 3)
  5. Enter 5 for No. of element division
  6. Apply
  7. Pick two vertical lines (lines 2 and 4)
  8. Enter 1 for No. of element division
  9. OK

Your screen should look something like this:

Plot Elements

You now have the privilege of knowing how to clear the mesh. You can play until you get the mesh that you are happy with. Good Luck!!