fea-nux

In Workbench Mechanical 12.0.1 (Workbench Simulation), a new enhancement is the ability to “hide” a Named Selection, which allows a user to (a) look “inside” of complicated geometry to select surfaces and (b) inspect the surface mesh for a portion of the model.

Simple geometry considered in this posting

For the first case, consider the geometry shown here.  It is a single part (“Translucency” modified in the Details view under “Geometry” to see inside the part better).  The outside is a simple cube, where there is a hollow region inside.  Normally, Depth Picking needs to be used to select interior surfaces.

Named Selection Detail view

After a Named Selection is created, note in the Details view that “Send to Solver” and “Visible” are new options present in 12.0.1.

If “Visible” is set to “No”, then the surfaces comprising the Named Selection will be hidden, allowing the user to examine or select interior surfaces.

Effect of hiding Named Selections

The effect of hiding a Named Selection comprised of the outer 2 surfaces is shown, where the inner geometry is now exposed and selectable.  This provides easier manipulation of the model by users.

Mesh of Named Selection of Inside Surfaces

In fact, if a Named Selection of inner surfaces were defined, the mesh of the surfaces of the Named Selections can be seen by setting “Display as Meshed: Yes” in the Details view of the parent “Named Selections” branch.