Automatic generation of quadrilateral meshes for the finite element analysis of metal forming processes

This paper presents an effort to provide basic features for the fully automatic generation of graded initial quadrilateral finite element meshes to be applied in the analysis of metal forming processes. A grid-based approach is utilised for generating an initial coarse mesh with well-shaped internal elements, and in cases where non-rectangular shapes are to be discretised, linking with the boundary is performed on the basis of constrained Delaunay triangulation. Local refinement of the mesh is undertaken in zones where plastic deformation is expected to take place during the initial stages of simulation. Improvement of the general shape of the resulting mesh elements is performed by means of an iterative Laplacian smoothing procedure. An example is given to illustrate the feasibility of the approach. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.