Stage of conversion with options

Introduction

The first stage is a stage of conversion of the mesh entities into geometric entities.

Volume element: reminder

In Flux, a volume element of the mesh is characterized by vertexes, edges and facets, as shown in the figure below:

Principle of operation

The principle of conversion shown in the scheme below is the following: all the vertexes, edges and facets of volume elements of initial file are converted into points, lines and faces in the final file.

The group concept, regrouping volume elements having the same material in the initial file, enables the creation of volumes in the Flux project.

Conversion of entities

The entities of the initial file are read and converted into Flux entities, as presented in the table below:

The file in the format … CAD entities contained … Converted into Flux entities …
NASTRAN / PATRAN / UNV / MED nodes

points defined by parameterized coordinates

nodes

line elements

lines of edges list type

line elements

face elements

faces of facets list type

face elements

groups:

component or material

volumes

Structure of data

In Flux, the geometric entities resulting from the mesh import differ from “standard” geometric entities:

  • the faces resulting from mesh import are faces of facets list type
  • the lines resulting from mesh import are lines of edges list type

Option selections for conversion

To perform the data conversion, different options are available to the user.

These options are of two types:

  • general options, available for all formats
    • choice of a coordinate system: to place the imported geometry in the Flux project
    • choice of the unit: to choose the units of the device dimensions
    • choice of precision: to define the minimal distance enabling to distinguish two points
  • particular options, specific to the format

Only the general options are described in this section.