Transformation of Panels to Solids

[trentunoo]

Hello,

I have been working on a 3-D channel which has a varying cross-section. I modelled it using the "panel" property and then tried to convert it to a "solid"  section. However, I was not able to do that.(See "Panel Model") It gives an error ("The solid has not been created").

Afterwards, I tried to model a single cross-section with the "panel" property and then extruded it, however the channel has varying cross-sections and my model was wrong. (See "Extrude Model")

Can you please propose a solution to my problem?

Thanks in advance

[Rafal.Gaweda · Accepted solution]

It should work : movie: http://screencast.com/t/3CXaPazGs749

Check whether all panels are flat and connected or send us file.

[willjvizcaya]

Greetings,

is it possible to convert frames to solids?

Best Regards,

[Rafal.Gaweda]

In case of steel bars you can import model to ASD Steel.

The if you want you can export it as ACIS *.sat file.

[A.Bugajski]

Hi,

I have difficulties in creating a 3D solid out of a panel element which consists of number of sides. When I click create solid from list of objects and pick my panel it seems to create a volumetric object, i.e. it appears in the list but it is not visible and when I delete the panel element there is nothing left on the screen.

I have imported the 3D geometry from ACIS file.

Can you please help. I have attached the .rtd file.

Regards,

Adrian

[Pawel.Pulak]

It is necessary to highlight the object, right mouse click to open the context menu and select Object Properties.

Then in the Object Properties it is necessary to change the object type from Shell to Solid:

But why you model such a thin-walled tube as solid?

Sufficient precision of solid elements will require at least 2 finite elements along the thickness of the wall - it will result in some abnormal number of elements.

Regards,

[A.Bugajski]

Thanks for that Pawel,

I have figured now how to convert it but encountered problems when meshing it. It just doesn't create a complete mesh on the solid (see attached).

Is there a way of transforming initial geometry i.e. panel consisting of sides into a tube (i.e. shell but with single surface)? 

The problem is that this is just an extract from the whole, very complex model that was imported from .sat file. The imported model consists of 'panels' (consisting of sides) but they have a separate internal and external face of every wall and I'm looking for an automatic way of transforming 3D solids into analytical model (either shell or solid). As you say shell would be more appropriate but would probably require manually deleting either external or internal face of the duct (tube) which is impractical.

Kind regards,

Adrian

[Pawel.Pulak]

Some possibilities to obtain shell model of the rectangular tube in case of model as yours - panels corresponding to all faces (inner, outer and front faces of walls) of the solid):

1/ or selecting inner and front faces of walls and setting them as Inactive using Geometry > Objects > Inactive Sides, then meshing the outer faces

2/ or meshing all faces, freezing meshes, then deleting meshes from the inner and front faces leaving only the outer ones

3/ or defining the contour corresponding to the front face of the tube, selecting it and extruding along the length of the tube, deleting the original model, meshing the extruded panel. As in the video available using this link:

http://screencast.com/t/fK87si3p2 

Needless to say that my choice would be 3/ 🙂

In cases 1/ or 2/ necesary to select to base the tube on the outer or inner surface of walls. Irregular mesh on ACIS objects.

In case 3/ possible to define the contour corresponding to the center of walls, regular rectangular mesh of extruded panels

Regards,

[A.Bugajski]

Pawel,

Thanks for your advice which is very appropriate for small models. The problem is, that my geometry is a bit more complicated (hundreds of segments of various geometry, not necessarilly as straight forward as the example.

Any idea how I could deal with the whole model (maybe using Autocad?, Revit?)

Kind regards,

Adrian

[Pawel.Pulak]

Yes, in case of very irregular models the approaches proposed by me may be inefficient.

The best would be some tool converting solids to mid-surface shells - but it does not exist in AutoCAD or Revit.

If all your solids are so thin-walled as the attached example then using inner or outer surface will not result in significant inaccuracy.

In such case you can try to import solids to AutoCAD, here EXPLODE them to regions, delete unnecessary regions leaving only those corresponding to outer or inner surfaces, then export it to SAT file.

This SAT file can be opened in Robot and regions will be read as faces (objects), which can be selected to create panels.

It is only one of possible workflows - probably not the best one. May be others will have better ideas...

Regards,

[Pawel.Pulak]

As concerns some tool converting solids to mid-surface shells it is available for instance in Autodesk Inventor.

See this post:

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Inventor-General/Inventor-2013-Stress-Analysis-Thin-Bodies/td-p/366432...

Regards,