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A strategy of automatic hexahedral mesh generation by using an improved whisker-weaving method with a surface mesh modification procedure

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Abstract

One of the demands for three dimensional (3D) finite element analyses is the development of an automatic hexahedral mesh generator. For this problem, several methods have been proposed by many researchers. However, reliable automatic hexahedral mesh generation has not been developed at present. In this paper, a new strategy of fully automatic hexahedral mesh generation is proposed. In this strategy, the prerequisite for generating a hexahedral mesh is a quadrilateral surface mesh. From the given surface mesh, combinatorial dual cycles (sheet loops for the whisker-weaving algorithm) are generated to produce a hexahedral mesh. Since generating a good quality hexahedral mesh does not depend only on the quality of quadrilaterals of the surface mesh but also on the quality of the sheet loops generated from it, a surface mesh modification method to remove self-intersections from sheet loops is developed. Next, an automatic hexahedral mesh generator by the improved whisker-weaving algorithm is developed in this paper. By creating elements and nodes on 3D real space during the weaving process, it becomes possible to generate a hexahedral mesh with fewer bad-quality elements. Several examples will be presented to show the validity of the proposed mesh generation strategy.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Systems Design for Ocean-Space, Faculty of Engineering, Yokohama National University, Yokohama, 240-8501, Japan

    Yasumi Kawamura & Yoichi Sumi

  2. Department of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Dhaka, 1000, Bangladesh

    Md. Shahidul Islam

Authors
  1. Yasumi Kawamura
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  2. Md. Shahidul Islam
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  3. Yoichi Sumi
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Correspondence to Yasumi Kawamura.

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Kawamura, Y., Islam, M.S. & Sumi, Y. A strategy of automatic hexahedral mesh generation by using an improved whisker-weaving method with a surface mesh modification procedure. Engineering with Computers 24, 215–229 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00366-008-0092-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00366-008-0092-3

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