Defining mesh properties with mesh collectors

Estimated time to complete: 15–25 minutes

In this tutorial, you will assign material and physical properties to a golf club assembly.

1: Setup

  1. On your desktop or the appropriate network drive, create a folder named material_physical.

  2. Click the link below:

    Download the part

  3. Extract the part file to your material_physical folder.

  4. Start Simcenter 3D or NX.

  5. Open Golf_Club_Assem_fem2.fem.

2: Reset dialog box memory

The options you select in dialog boxes are preserved for the next time you open the same dialog box within a given session. Restore the default settings to ensure that the dialog boxes are in the expected initial state for each step of the activity.

File

Preferences→User Interface

  • Options

  •   Reset Dialog Memory

  • OK

     
3: Create a graphite material record

Create a new material, Graphite, by copying and editing the Nylon material record.

 Manage Materials (Properties group)

  • Materials

    Nylon

  • Copy

    The Isotropic Material dialog box opens.

  • Name - Description

    Graphite

  •  

     

  • Mass Density

    1.4e-006 kg/mm³

  •  

    Mechanical

  • Young's Modulus

    14500 MPa
    Note:

    Make sure that you change the units to MPa.

  • Poisson's Ratio

    0.4

  •  

    Strength

  • Yield Strength

    110 MPa
    Note:

    Make sure that you change the units to MPa.

  • Ultimate Tensile Strength

    165 MPa

  • OK

      Isotropic Material dialog box

  • Close

     
4: Create a mesh collector for a graphite shaft

Create a 2D mesh collector for the shaft of the club using Graphite as the material.

  Mesh Collector (Properties group)

  • Element Family

    2D

  • Collector Type

    ThinShell

  • Name

    Shaft graphite

  •  

      Create Physical (Shell Property)

  • Name

    Shaft graphite

  • Material 1

    Graphite

  • Default Thickness

    1.5 mm

  • OK

     both dialog boxes

 

The new collector appears in the Simulation Navigator.

2D Collectors
Shaft steel
Shaft graphite
3D Collectors
Head steel
Ferrule
Grip
5: Change the mesh display color

Change the display color of the new mesh collector to medium faded red.

  Simulation Navigator

  •     2D Collectors

  •   Shaft graphite

  •   Edit Display

  •   Color

  •  

  • ID

    155

    (Medium Faded Red)

  • Enter

     

  • OK

     both dialog boxes
6: Move the shaft mesh

All meshes assigned to a collector inherit the properties of the collector. When you reassign a mesh from one collector to another, the properties of the mesh automatically change to that of the new collector.

  Simulation Navigator

  •   2D Collectors→Shaft steel

  •   2d_mesh(1) and drag it from Shaft steel to the Shaft graphite node.

  • Apply Defaults

     Move Mesh Display Settings box

  • ESC

     
    Note:

    Pressing ESC clears the selection color.

  Save

You can zoom in to see that the color of the shaft has changed from gray to red, which is the display color of the Shaft graphite collector.

You can also examine the Simulation Navigator to see that the shaft mesh is now assigned to the Shaft graphite collector.

2D Collectors
Shaft steel
Shaft graphite
2D_mesh(1)
7: Examine the material view

By switching the Simulation Navigator to Material View, you can identify the material assigned to each collector, mesh, and polygon body.

  Simulation Navigator

  •   Name (the column title)

  •   Material View

  •   Materials→Polycarbonate→Ferrule

Similarly expand the nodes for Polypropylene, Graphite, Steel, and No Material. You can see that Graphite is now the material associated with the shaft mesh.

Materials
Steel
Head steel
3D_mesh(3)
Shaft steel
Polycarbonate
Ferrule
3D_mesh(1)
Graphite
Shaft graphite
2D_mesh(1)
Polypropylene
Grip
3D_mesh(2)
No Material
Ferrule (1)
Shaft (2)
Head (3)
Grip (4)

By expanding the No Material node, you see that materials are not assigned to the polygon bodies. Because each collector has an assigned material and each mesh is assigned to a collector, it is not necessary to have materials assigned to the polygon bodies.

Switch the Simulation Navigator back to Standard View.

  Simulation Navigator

  •   Name (the column title)

  •   Standard View

The meshing process is now complete.

  Save

File

  • Close →All Parts