SALOME documentation central

Smoothing


Smoothing is used to adjust the locations of element corners (nodes) to reduce distortions in these elements.

To apply smoothing to the elements of your mesh:

  1. In the Modification menu select the Smoothing item or click "Smoothing" button in the toolbar.

    image84.png
    "Smoothing" button

    The following dialog will appear:

    smoothing.png
  2. In this dialog:

    • specify the IDs of the elements which will be smoothed:

      • Select the whole mesh, submesh or group activating this checkbox; or
      • choose mesh elements with the mouse in the 3D Viewer. It is possible to select a whole area with a mouse frame; or
      • input the element IDs directly in ID Elements field. The selected elements will be highlighted in the viewer; or
      • apply Filters. Set filter button allows to apply a filter to the selection of elements. See more about filters in the Selection filter library page.

    • define the Fixed nodes ids that should remain at their location during smoothing. If a mesh is built on a shape, the nodes built on its geometric edges are always fixed. If the smoothing is applied to a part of the mesh, the nodes of boundary elements are also fixed. It is possible to additionally fix any other nodes. The fixed nodes can be selected manually or by filters, just as the smoothed elements.
    • choose the Smoothing Method:

      • Laplacian smoothing pulls a node toward the center of surrounding nodes directly connected to that node along an element edge.
      • Centroidal smoothing pulls a node toward the element-area-weighted centroid of the surrounding elements.

        Typically, the Laplacian method will produce the mesh with the least element distortion. It is also the fastest method. Centroidal smoothing usually produces a mesh with more uniform element sizes. Both methods produce good results with "free" meshes.

      image83.gif

    • specify the Iteration limit. Both smoothing methods iterate through a number of steps to produce the resulting smoothed mesh. At each new step the smoothing is reevaluated with the updated nodal locations. This process continues till the limit of iterations has been exceeded, or till the aspect ratio of all element is less than or equal to the specified one.
    • specify the Max. aspect ratio - the target mesh quality at which the smoothing algorithm should stop the iterations.
    • activate in parametric space checkbox if it is necessary to to improve the shape of faces in the parametric space of geometrical surfaces on which they are generated, else the shape of faces in the 3D space is improved.
  3. Click Apply or Apply and Close button to confirm the operation.
smoothing1.png

The initial mesh

smoothing2.png

The smoothed mesh


See Also a sample TUI Script of a Smoothing operation.


Copyright © 2007-2008 CEA/DEN, EDF R&D, OPEN CASCADE
Copyright © 2003-2007 OPEN CASCADE, EADS/CCR, LIP6, CEA/DEN, CEDRAT, EDF R&D, LEG, PRINCIPIA R&D, BUREAU VERITAS