Software Products

TYPE

TOOL

APPLICATION

MAIN ADVANTAGE

DESCRIPTION

Structured

Command line primitives and FISH

• Available from the command line
• Any type of problem
• Better suited for simple geometries
• Very time consuming for complex geometries

• Quality

• Includes pre-meshed primitive shapes (hex, cylinder, tunnel intersections, ...), and topography conforming functionality (for v. 5.0 and up)
• FISH language can be used to deform the grid to better fit the geometry to be modeled
• ZONE SPLIT split command allows automatically dividing all tetrahedral and wedge shaped zones into hexahedrons (v 5.0 and up)
• Basic unstructured tetrahedral mesh generation on closed volumes (new in v 6.0)

Structured

Primitives Commands & FISH – Octree mesh

• Available from the command line
• Any type of numerical problem
• Better suited for complex geometries

• Efficiency

• In addition to primitives, topography (v 5.0 and up) and geometric data (v 5.0 and up) commands, the DENSIFY command automatically builds octree meshes from surfaces and volumes
• FISH language can also be used to deform the grid to better fit the geometry to be modeled

Structured

Interactive 2D extrusion (v 5.0 and up required)

• Available from the FLAC3D interface
• For extruded geometries only

• Efficiency
• Quality

• Allows interactive definition of a 2D section and then extrusion to create zones
• DXF or bitmap can be imported and used as a background, with snapping available

Structured

Interactive Building Block (NEW in v 6.0)

• Available from theFLAC3Dinterface
• Any type of problem
• Better suited for simple to moderately complex geometries

• Quality

• Structured meshing capabilities
• Option to automatically block geometries for subsequent editing
• DRAPE command automatically conforms the surface of the model to a supplied topography

Structured

InteractiveBlockRanger

• Available from the Rhino interface
• Any type of problem
• Better suited for simple to moderately complex geometries

• Quality
• Complete CAD system environment

• Itasca interactive mapped mesher
• Generates all-hex meshes

Unstructured

Interactive Griddle (NEW)

• Available from the Rhino interface
• Any type of problem
• Better suited for complex geometries

• Efficiency
• Complete CAD system environment

• NEW Itasca interactive automesher
• Generates tetrahedral and hex-dominant meshes