Improving Mesh Quality for Curved Surfaces in Simulations

Improving mesh quality for curved surfaces ensures simulation accuracy. When mesh resolution is poor at curved interfaces (red-circled areas), results suffer. Solution: increase mesh resolution in Initial Mesh Settings or apply Length Based controls.

In the image above, we can see a simulation with a poorly meshed curve at the interface between the blue and green regions. The red circles highlight areas where the mesh elements are too large to accurately capture the curved geometry, which can lead to inaccurate simulation results.

Primary Solution: Increase Initial Mesh Resolution

The most effective solution is to increase the initial mesh resolution:

1. Right-click on Mesh in the project tree and select Initial Mesh Settings
   
   
2. Under Curved Surface Meshing, move the Resolution slider toward the Fine end
3. This adjustment increases the mesh density around curved surfaces, producing results similar to the below image where the mesh properly conforms to the geometry

 

Additional Mesh Refinement Techniques

If increasing the initial mesh resolution isn't sufficient, try these additional approaches:

Add Length-Based Mesh Controls

1. Right-click on Mesh in the project tree
2. Select Assign Mesh Operation → On Selection → Length Based
3. Apply this to the curved edges requiring refinement
4. Length-based controls allow precise element sizing on specific geometric features

Increase Adaptive Passes in Solution Setup

1. Access the Solve Setup dialog
2. Navigate to the Convergence tab
3. Increase values for Minimum Number of Passes and Minimum Converged Passes
   
   

More adaptive passes will progressively refine the mesh in areas of high solution gradients

Benefits of Proper Mesh Refinement

A well-resolved mesh will provide:

• Higher element density at the curved interface
• Smooth transition in field values (shown by the color gradient)
• More accurate representation of the physical phenomena being simulated

Allocating appropriate mesh density to critical geometric features ensures simulation accuracy while maintaining computational efficiency.