This document is the main user guide for the Sierra/Percept capabilities including the me sh_adapt and me sh_transf er tools. Basic capabilities for uniform mesh refinement (UMR) and mesh trans- fers are discussed. Examples are used to provide illustration. Future versions of this manual will include more advanced features such as geometry and mesh smoothing. Additionally, all the options for the mesh_adapt code will be described in detail. Capabilities for local adaptivity in the context of offline adaptivity will also be included. This page intentionally left blank.
Solution verification is the process of verifying the solution of a finite element analysis by performing a series of analyses on meshes of increasing mesh densities, to determine if the solution is converging. Solution verification has historically been too expensive, relying upon refinement templates resulting in an 8X multiplier in the number of elements. For even simple convergence studies, the 8X and 64X meshes must be solved, quickly exhausting computational resources. In this paper, we introduce Mesh Scaling, a new global mesh refinement technique for building series of all-hexahedral meshes for solution verification, without the 8X multiplier. Mesh Scaling reverse engineers the block decomposition of existing all-hexahedral meshes followed by remeshing the block decomposition using the original mesh as the sizing function multiplied by any positive floating number (e.g. 0.5X, 2X, 4X, 6X, etc.), enabling larger series of meshes to be constructed with fewer elements, making solution verification tractable.
Verification of tightly coupled multiphysics computational codes is generally significantly more difficult than verification of single-physics codes. The case of coupled heat conduction and thermal radiation in an enclosure is considered, and it is extended to a manufactured solution verification test for enclosure radiation to a fully two-dimensional coupled problem with conduction and thermal radiation. Convergence results are shown using a production thermal analysis code. Convergence rates are optimal with a pairwise view-factor calculation algorithm.