About Proximity and Orientation Requirements

To create realistic sliding contact, two surfaces must meet certain proximity and orientation requirements.

This page discusses:

See Also
About Surface-Based Contact and Tied Connections

When you use the contact detection tool or directly create surface-based contact pairs:

  • The two surfaces must be roughly facing each other.
  • Display options may affect the distance between surfaces.

Orientation

Two surfaces must be facing each other to allow bonded or sliding contact to be defined. For example, contact could not be created in the following geometry. The parallel faces in each component are offset from each other, and the angle between the perpendicular faces is too large.

Display Options

The separation calculations for contact surface pairs are based on the display geometry of a model. The display geometry may differ from the true geometry based on your display accuracy settings. A low accuracy setting can introduce tessellation to your display geometry, which in turn can impact the tolerance calculations. For example, tessellation on a convex surface may cause increased separation from a mating surface:

If contact detection does not work or you are unable to define surface-based contact between two surfaces, increasing the display accuracy may decrease the separation distance between the surfaces. However, more commonly you must adjust the geometry of the model to bring the surfaces into conformance with the proximity requirements.