Browsers supply a great deal of view-related functionality in HyperMesh by listing the parts of a model in a tabular and/or tree-based format, and providing controls inside the table
that allow you to alter the display of model parts.
Perform automatic checks on CAD models, and identify potential issues with geometry that may slow down the meshing
process using the Verification and Comparison tools.
Space frames are models that have a sparse distribution of elements, such as a car body. Space frame models can generally
have element counts in the hundreds of thousands, but their basic structure is rather simple.
Shell models are models that are made up primarily of shell elements, namely, quads, and trias. In general, a shell
model represents many parts, each with numerous features such as holes and edges, and connected together using 1D
elements such as bars and rigids.
Global handles are most effective when used to make general shape changes for a model, such as changing the basic
shape of a model, stretching parts of a model, or making changes that involve the movement of many local handles.
Solid models are models that are made up of solid elements, namely, tetras, pentas, and hexas. In general, a solid
model represents a single part with numerous features such as holes, edges, bosses, flanges and ribs.
Shell models are models that are made up primarily of shell elements, namely, quads, and trias. In general, a shell
model represents many parts, each with numerous features such as holes and edges, and connected together using 1D
elements such as bars and rigids.
Morph constraints are a powerful tool that can be used to restrict the movement of
nodes during morphing operations.
The following types of constraints can be applied to any node: fixed, cluster, along
vector, on plane, along line, on surface, and on elements. Whenever a handle is moved
that influences a node which is constrained, the node is moved according to the handle
perturbation and is then projected back onto the feature to which it is constrained.
This allows the nodes to slide across vectors, lines, planes, surfaces, and meshes, to
remain fixed when handles are moved, or to move as a cluster along with other nodes. You
may also constrain nodes where handles are located which, in effect, constrains the
handles. When a perturbation is applied to a constrained handle, the handle are moved
along the constraint feature regardless of the applied perturbation. This means that if
you apply a translation in the x direction on a handle that is constrained along a
vector x - y = 0, the handle moves along both the x and y axes.
There are also morph constraints that can be applied to domains, such as the smooth
constraint, which applies spline-based smoothing along the constrained edge domains, and
model constraints, which allow you to set a given parametric target, such as length,
angle and mass, and have HyperMorph adjust the model to meet
that target. These constraints as well as bounded and set distance options for the node
constraints are described more fully in the panel help.
Morph constraints can be very useful for morphing a mesh that has been mapped to,
projected to, or created upon a surface. Note that the map to geom operation allows you
to have a morph constraint automatically created after mapping. Once you have done so,
the nodes will remain on the surface during morphing operations.
Note: Although morph
constraints can keep nodes on a curved line or surface during morphing operations,
when morphs are saved as shapes and then turned into shape variables for
optimization, the nodes will not stay on the line or surface during optimization.
This is because optimization is a linear process and the shapes will be treated as
linear, meaning that the nodes will move directly from their original point to their
maximally perturbed point without moving along any constraint.