Master in Computational Mechanics Computational Mechanics Tools

GiD Practice Year 2016-2017

Sample of geometry creation with GiD

This tutorial describe some of the basic tools available in the GiD preprocess used to create or
modify the geometry of a model.
In the GiD Reference Manual all the commands and tools are explained; in this tutorial only
some of them will be used to build a simple 3D model.
This tutorial shows the different ways that GiD offers to enter the coordinates of a point
(absolute, relative, polar, etc.), the use of the copy and move tool, the intersection of curves,
how to collapse entities, the use of layers, etc.

Description of the model

The model we want to create is a roman bridge; it is necessary to consider that the model is
destined to generate a volume mesh of three-dimensional elements (tetrahedrons)
The roman bridge is the following one:

The dimensions are the following: (measurements in meters)

The bridge is a sequence of arcs; we will build one arc, and then, we will make copies of it.

Entering the coordinates

First, we will start defining with Cartesian coordinates the lines on the XY plane. We create the
first 4 lines.
Commands can be entered in different ways: writing in the command line, clicking on an icon, or
from a menu.
Geometry Create Line
0,0
2,0
2,3
0,3
close
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Master in Computational Mechanics Computational Mechanics Tools
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Point labels could be shown using the menu: View->Label->All in->points

If the third coordinate is not entered, GiD assumes that z=0; command “close”, closes the
polygon joining with a line the last and first point entered.

Next line will start from point number 3 (note that we don’t' want to create a new point, point 3
will be used).

When selecting the line tool, the Contextual menu changes, offering
commands related with line creation (Contextual menu is in the mouse
menu - click the right mouse button to open that menu)
We will use option "Join" of the Contextual menu to select points which
already exist.

NOTE: <Control-a> toggles between "Join" and "No join" modes.

After selecting "Join", click over point 3 (or enter the number in the command bar), change
mode to "No join", either using the Contextual menu or with <Control-a>. Now, we can create
points 5, 6 and 7 using relative coordinates (to use relative coordinates we'll have to put a @
before the number)

Geometry Create Line

join
3
nojoin
@0,6
@1<180
@1<180
join
4

Point 5 has the same coordinates as point 3 plus 6 vertical units. Points 6 and 7 are created
using relative polar coordinates (@modulus<angle with x axis in degrees). Relative coordinates
consider the last point entered.

Command @1<180 is repeated two times; we can enter again the last command pressing the
up button <↑>.

Using the “Copy” and “Move” tools

The copy (Utilities->Copy) and move tool perform a lot of functions, like rotations, translations,
mirrors, with multiple copies, extrusions, collapse of new entities, etc.

To create the arcs of half bridge we will use the copy tool: we will rotate the points 5 and 6
around a center located at (10,9,0), and lines will be extruded.
Rotation is 2D, and we'll have to enter a negative angle of -90º (anti-clockwise)

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GiD Practice Year 2016-2017

In a similar way, can create lines by extrusion with a translation transformation, for example
copy the line number 7 with a relative translation from (0,0,0) to (0,10,0), extruding lines.

Create the other lines to have a model like the next image:

We'll create NURBS surfaces, selecting its boundary lines.

Geometry Create NurbsSurface
And click the lines
1 2 3 4
escape
Surfaces are represented in ‘normal render’ colored in pink.

It exist an automatic mode creation; GiD tries to find the possible surfaces with a specified
number of sides, for example we will create surfaces with 4, and 5 sides:

Geometry Create NurbsSurface Automatic

4
5
escape

Now all surfaces are in the plane z=0, some of them must have another z, so we'll have to move
them using the "move" tool (similar to "copy").

Surfaces 1 and 5 are leaved in z=0, and we move surfaces {3} with
an increment of dz=-1.0 and surfaces {2,4,6} with dz=-2.0.

The "move" tool must be configured as:

- Moving surfaces.
- Translation, from relative coordinates (0,0,0) to (0,0,-1) for
surface {3} and from (0,0,0) to (0,0,-2) for surfaces {2,4,6}
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Note: entity numbers are referred to the picture; depending on the followed process your model
can show other identifiers.

We build now the surfaces of the opposite face and the lateral extruded
ones by using the "copy" tool, extruding surfaces.

- Relative translation, with dz= -6 for surfaces {1,5}, dz=-4 for surfaces
{3}, and dz= -2 for surfaces {2,4,6}.

Choose the option View->Render->Flat lighting from the mouse menu to

visualize a more realistic version of the model. Then return to the normal
visualization using Render-> Normal

Cleaning the volume

Our target is to create a unique volume which can be meshed; elements must cover all the
domain without any overlapping between them.

So, we need to delete the internal surfaces to get the "shell" of the volume. (“boundary
representation”). The best solution is to delete all surfaces and create them again later.
To delete all surfaces use command Geometry Delete Surface and select them all.

We also need to remove all lines that are inside the volume; some of them must be divided
because only a piece is inside the volume.
We can divide all lines with a multiple intersection between all lines. All lines can be selected
using command 1:, which means "from line 1 to the last one".

Menu: Geometry->Edit->Intersection-> Lines

And select all

Now it's possible to manually delete those lines which are inside the volume:

To be sure that there are not duplicated points, we'll use the "Collapse" command. We collapse
the model with the menu: Geometry->Edit->Collapse->Model.

NOTE: you have to make sure that the variable "Import Tolerance" is small enough to avoid the
collapse of points which are really different; "Import Tolerance" can be set in the Preferences
window, under Import settings.

Now, we create again all the surfaces automatic with 4, 5, and 6 sides.
We'll have to delete some extra surfaces which are not needed; these surfaces are unneeded
interior walls.

Creating the volume

Now we create a volume specifying the surfaces of its contour (all in this case)

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When selecting entities, by default, the first time an entity is clicked it becomes selected, the
second time it's clicked, that entity deselects (“SwapSelection”). This can be changed from the
Contextual menu with options “AddToSelection" (always adds new entities, never deselects),
“RemoveFromSel” (only removes entities from selection) and "ClearSelection” (deselects all).

GiD draws volumes in blue. If the contour of a volume doesn't close, GiD informs of the number
of entities where there are problems; it's useful in these cases to label entities (View - Label) to
find and correct the problem.

If the group of surfaces define a unique volume, it's useful to use option "search", which finds all
the surfaces of a volume automatically (user has to select only one of them). If the group of
surfaces defines many volumes and we use the "search" option, we'll have to check if the
volume created is the one we wanted.

Then, we create the other half of the bridge using the 3D mirror tool (Copy window). The mirror
requires three coordinates to define the mirror plane: pick three existent points (unaligned).
In that case we have to select volumes as source to be copied; it's important to not check option
"Duplicate entities", to avoid the creation of duplicated points ones over the others, else a
collapse can be required.

Using layers
With a complex geometry is highly recommended to divide the entities by layers; like this, it's
possible to hide those layers which we don't need to see
(it makes selection processes easier and avoid confusions).

Menu: Utilities->Layers…

Objects by default are created in a layer called "Layer0". We create a

new layer, called "bridge"; we send the volume and all its dependent
entities to that layer using the "Send To" option.
“Also lower entities” option must be selected.

It's recommended to save the model every certain time, to avoid a

possible loss of the work by a failure of the system (every certain time,
according to the preferences, GiD also makes a backup).

We save the model with option “Files->Save as...”.

Meshing test
We can create the mesh of our model with the command
“Generate” found in the "Mesh" menu (we'll accept the size by
default)

We get a mesh with tetrahedrons for the volume similar to the

following one: (it can vary according to the current meshing
preferences)

Creating all the bridge

Finally we can make a copy of the volume and the railings, by means of a relative translation
(selecting two points as origin - destiny), without extrusion, and with 5 multiple copies

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NOTE: when copying geometry the mesh it's not automatically copied; it's also possible to make
copies of the mesh, which is unadvised because conditions would not be applied correctly.

Tests of mesh generation

To do tests quickly we delete the copied volumes (and his lower-entities) to have only one.

Following the previous model, the geometry has volume entities, then by default, when
generating a mesh we will obtain unstructured tetrahedra, and any surface nor line elements,
because these entities are hierarchically lower-entities of the volume.

If we want also to obtain this triangles and/or line elements, we must explicitly specify it, from
the menu:

Mesh->Mesh criteria

E.g. we can force to not to mesh the volume and mesh only the lines, with

Mesh->Mesh criteria->No mesh->Volumes

And select the required entities
Mesh->Mesh criteria->Mesh->Lines
And select all curves

Note: an easy mode to select all entities is to writing in the command line
1:
What means from the number 1 to the last

If we generate a mesh again, we can see that now there are only line elements (2-noded)

Analogously we can force to mesh only the surfaces using

Mesh->Mesh criteria->Mesh->Surfaces

From left to right: line mesh with hidden and visible nodes, and triangle mesh

By default, the nodes are not displayed, we can write:

escape escape escape view entities nodes

Or using the buttons on the right menu (hidden by default): View->entities->nodes

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Types of elements

The different types of elements that GiD can generate are: lines, triangles, quadrilaterals,
tetrahedra, hexahedra, prisms, spheres and points. They can have linear or quadratic degree.
For example, triangles can be linear of 3 nodes or quadratic of 6 nodes, quadrilaterals can be of
4, 8 or 9 nodes.
Before meshing the degree must be selected, from the menu: Mesh-> Quadratic elements

All elements of the grid must have the same degree, i.e. cannot be mixed linear with quadratic
elements.
The quadratic elements can be interesting on the one hand to get a better approximation of the
grid to the original shape (in case of entities with curvature), and secondly, in order to better
represent the solution in numerical computations. Usually this aspect is more important than the
improvement in the representation of form.

For example, a structural analysis of a classic beam subjected to bending, in a planar section
the deformation follows a linear law. If we use a linear approximation for the displacements, we
will have in an element a constant deformation (because it is derived from the displacement).
With a quadratic finite element the deformation field is linear, more realistic.

Example linear and quadratic triangles (shown with curved sides)

Note: Depending on your preferences, quadratic elements are represented as if they were
linear (for more efficient redraw), or with curved sides.

For surfaces it is possible to create triangles or quadrilaterals with structured or unstructured

meshes.

In GiD we can classify meshes in three categories: structured, semi-structured and unstructured
(structured in an extrusion direction and unstructured in its two tops)

With the options

Mesh-> Structured-> Lines / Surfaces / Volume

We can control that we want to be structured.

A structured grid is one in which the nodes are created according to a predefined pattern.
In GiD to mesh a surface with structured quadrilaterals, it is necessary that its shape is
topologically rectangle with four corners (To create structured hexahedra GiD restrictions are
stronger: it is necessary that the volume takes exactly 6 faces each one with 4 sides).

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Example of structured and unstructured mesh of triangles and quadrilaterals

Structures meshes have the advantage that usually lead to fewer nodes and elements, which
requires a lower cost for the analysis, in addition elements tend to be more symmetrical, which
can improve the numerical solution. The major drawback is that it requires a very important
geometric manipulation, often impractical. Another important drawback is that it does not allow
local refinements, because the number of divisions in each direction must be maintained.
An unstructured mesh usually requires no user manipulation. The triangles are better suited to a
general shape that quadrilaterals.

The menu option to specify that a surface must be meshed with quadrilaterals is:
Mesh-> Element type-> Quadrilateral

Unstructured quadrilaterals using two different algorithms

Mesh sizes control and elements quality

The normal way to work with GiD is to assign to geometric entities information about what mesh
sizes do you want to obtain.
For example, suppose that you want to concentrate more element in the center of the arc,
where bending stresses of the structure will be more significant.

Attach a size of 0.2 units to the lines near the bridge center, and set 5 as general size
Mesh-> Unstructured-> Assign sizes on lines 0.2
Mesh-> Generate mesh… 5

The size of 0.2 was assigned to the whole geometric entity, in this case the whole line, if we
want to have more local control, it might be interesting to divide entities to assign sizes
individually.

We may assign size of 0.2 only to the mirror plane points, to concentrate elements here.

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To remove the information from previous size, we use: Mesh-> Reset mesh data

Mesh-> Unstructured-> Assign sizes on points 0.2

Concentration of sizes in lines and points in the center of the arc

The generic size of 5 units is not achieved by any element, because geometric entities are not
as big. That size is the desired one, and generated elements will try to grow up until it is
reached. The mesh generation algorithm is an "advancing front": Fist the boundary is meshed
and then element generation progress to fill the interior. It is important therefore to assign the
appropriate sizes to contour entities.

There is a parameter that controls the speed of transition of the element’s size. This parameter
is set in the Preferences window (Utilities-> Preferences). With a low value the transition will be
slow and vice versa.

Transition parameter set to minimum and maximum values

GiD incorporates three surface unstructured meshers: Rfast, Rsurf and Rjump

Rfast creates the mesh in a two-dimensional parameter space, and after that nodes are
"mapped" to the real 3D space, while Rsurf generates triangles directly in three-dimensional
space.
Rjump works like Rfast in the 3D space but trying to jump between surfaces.

Generally it is advisable for a first test to use RFast, which as its name suggests is faster. In
certain surfaces, where the parameterization is not uniform, it may be convenient to use Rsurf
to achieve better quality (more equilateral triangles).

It is possible to plot graphs showing the quality of the elements, according to different criteria:
minimum/maximum angle, edge size, volume element, and so on.
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Menu: Mesh-> Mesh quality.

Cumulative graph of elements with minimum angle of poor quality

Note: When you double-click on the graphic elements with quality worse that shown in the
horizontal scale will be selected.

If a surface has a corner with a very acute angle, at that point elements will result in poor quality.
It may be desirable to modify the geometry to avoid this kind of problems.

CALCULATION

Continuing with the previous model, we are going to analyze it with a linear elastic model, using
RamSolid. GiD itself does not incorporate any calculation program. It has been designed as a
neutralpre and postprocess that could be coupled to any external module. One example is
RamSeries: a program to perform structural analysis (linear and non-linear static and dynamic
analysis). RamSeries comprises two modules: RamBshell and RamSolid.

RamBshell can analyze shells and beams coupled, where each node has associated 6 degrees
of freedom (3 displacements and 3 rotations)

RamSolid can analyze three-dimensional solid, with 3 degrees of freedom per node (3
movements). This difference of degrees of freedom between solids and beams / shells is
responsible that they can’t be mixed in a consistent way.

RamSeries can be downloaded from the Web COMPASS: http://www.compassis.com

To use it professionally requires a "password". You can obtain a temporary "password" from the
related Web. The password must be entered in the Help-> Register Problem type window.

A registered version of the program is already installed on the course net.

To load the "RamSolid problemtype” in GiD must use the menu:

Data-> Problemtype-> Ramseries5.6-> Ramsolid

By doing this, a specific toolbar will appear, and some menus will be modified.

We are going to analyze the bridge with self-weight load, plus an additional pressure of 500
kp/m2 on the top. Supports are all fixed except the central pillars, simulating that water has
eroded its foundation.

The basic steps to follow are:

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Assign materials: We use a material with elastic modulus E = 2e5 Kp/cm2, Poisson modulus=
0.3 and specific weight = 2.5 ton/m3

Be careful with the units. In the “general data” window declare that the units of the mesh are
meters, and set for example that we want postprocess results in kp and cm.

We define the direction of gravity pointing to the negative Y axis.

In the materials and boundary conditions window, the units of each value could be selected by
the user, to feel comfortable. For example choosing kp ad cm for the material, we must set E =
2e5 Kp/cm2 (2e10 N/m2), and specific weight = 2500e6 kp/cm3 (25000 N/m3)

We separate the load cases in two simple load cases: self-weight and load of 500 kp/m2 (5000
N/m2), to see its effects independently or combined.

As boundary conditions, we set the basis of all pillars with no movement, except the central one
that leaves free.

You must generate the mesh again, to refresh the conditions that we have changed on the
geometry. After meshing all conditions are automatically transferred to nodes and/or elements,
and then run the calculation.
Calculate-> Calculate…

We can follow the progress of the analysis using Calculate-> View process info

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A message will indicate that the calculation is finished, and then we can swap to postprocess to
view the results: Menu Files-> Postprocess

stress-x on the deformed bridge

POSTPROCESS

RamSeries modify the GiD standard ‘View results' postprocess menus.

With the 'Windows> View Style' window we can select different kinds of visualization of the grid:

Boundary visualization

Body lines visualization

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Master in Computational Mechanics Computational Mechanics Tools
GiD Practice Year 2016-2017

GiD, is a neutral program separated from the analysis code, could not know the physical
meaning of the results, a value called ‘displacement’, ‘temperature’ or ‘damage factor’ is nothing
more than a label for GiD. Just know if it is a scalar value (temperatures, damage factor), a
vector (velocity, deformation) or a 3x3 symmetric matrix (stress, strain). So the user is
responsible of how to use them.
e.g, GiD can deform the mesh with a vector result, but if the user chooses 'speed' as vector the
deformated shape will not have a logical meaning.

There are two basic types of results: nodal results and elemental results (in Gauss points,
generally used as integration points within the finite element).
Gaussian results are extrapolated to nodes to define this field in the whole space. Results will
be then showed discontinuous between neighbor elements (e.g. with a Contour Fill), it is
possible to calculate a smoothed continuous field by assigning a single value to shared nodes
(e.g. using a Smooth Contour will do this).

Typical visualizations for scalar results are:

'Contour fill': stripes between iso-lines filled with a map of colors

'Contour lines': colored iso-lines

'Show Min Max': shows the location of the maximum and minimum values of a result

'Scalar line diagram': to draw graphs over beam line elements (bending, shear effort, etc.)

'Iso surfaces': draw a surface that represents points of constant value of a volumetric field.
e.g. to visualize the free surface of a fluid, or the filling of a mould, etc.

For vector magnitudes:

'Display vectors', as the name indicates draw vector arrows (in case of vector results and also
with results matrix where eigenvectors are drawn in blue for negative compressions and in red
for positive tractions).

'Deformations' deform the mesh according to a result vector (nodes displacement). Generally it
is interesting to contrast this mesh against the original one.

'Stream lines', lines that are instantaneously tangents to a vector field, typically a field of
velocities, to show streams of particles inside a fluid (e.g. air, water).

Using ‘Windows> Results' and 'Windows> Deform Mesh' you can get these views:

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Master in Computational Mechanics Computational Mechanics Tools
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Sometimes seeing the whole 3D mesh could be confusing. In this case for example a
longitudinal 2D cut of the bridge can be understood easily.

Cut showing principal stress vectors of compression and tension

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Master in Computational Mechanics Computational Mechanics Tools
GiD Practice Year 2016-2017

Succession of 26 cuts (Do Cuts-> succession) with a contour fill of the Tyz stress

These cuts, but deformed, showing the original grid as reference

These cuts, but deformed, showing the reference grid distorted

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