A flexible automatic hexahedral mesh generation by boundary-fit method

A general-purpose automatic hexahedral mesh generation system for FEA (Finite Element Analysis) was developed, based on a shape recognition technique and the boundary-fit method. In this system, a solid model is analyzed and decomposed into single-connected sub-models. Then, other sub-models topologically identical to the original ones are constructed using only orthogonal angles. Cubes are used to construct intermediate models, which reassemble these, and finally, hexahedral meshes are generated by mapping the cubes back onto the original solid model. In order to make the automatic system more flexible and friendly to the user, this system also has the capability to interact with the user to modify the intermediate models used in the system to improve the quality of generated mesh, or to help the system to circumvent various topological difficulties. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.