ANSYS 12.1 Tutorial - Evaluate Mesh Quality

Demo video

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Step-by-step instructions

In previous versions, if the user wants to evaluate the mesh quality, he/she has to utilize FE Modeler or other advanced meshing tools such as ICEM. ANSYS Workbench V12.1, as well as V12.0, presents new functionality which allows the users to view mesh metric information directly and thereby evaluate the mesh quality. Below are detailed descriptions on how to do it.

After generating a mesh, we can access information of mesh metrics under Details of “Mesh”:

Figure 1. To view Mesh Metrics of whole model

There are seven mesh metrics available: Element Quality, Aspect Ratio, Jacobian Ratio, Warping Factor, Parallel Deviation, Maximum Corner Angle and Skewness. The default is “None” to turn off mesh metric viewing.

What we check here is mesh metric of whole model. If we choose a single part under Geometry, we can check mesh metric just for this part. However, there is a limitation: The information presented here is grey-marked. That means we cannot change to other mesh metrics than that defined under Mesh.

Figure 2. To view mesh metric for a single part

After selecting the mesh metric of interest from the drop-down menu, a bar graph is displayed under the graphic window for the selected mesh metric:

Figure 3. Bar graph for Element Quality

In the bar graph, all existed element types in the model are represented. The x-axis is the value of the selected mesh metric and the y-axis is the number of elements within a particular quality factor range (the default), or the percentage of the total volume represented by the elements within a particular quality factor range. We can control settings of the bar graph by clicking on “Controls” on the top left corner:

Figure 4. The bar graph controls

If we click on a bar, elements within the value of the selected bar are displayed in the graphic window. The rest will be represented by transparent geometry. We can hold on the CTRL key to select multiple bars and all elements corresponding to the selected bars will be displayed:

Figure 5. Elements corresponding to selected bars

Some extra words: it is possible to show worst element for a selected mesh metric in ANSYS Workbench V12.0 but not in V12.1.

Figure 6. Show worst elements.

Figure 7. The worst elements are marked by red lines.

Do you want to learn more?

EDR provides a training course that covers basic Workbench operations, as well as other interesting topics.

 Or contact our ANSYS Support to ask for hints!