You can use contact detection to identify surfaces in a model
that have high potential for contact and creates surface-based contact features
for them.
Note:
The contact detection tool does not create contact features between
different surfaces on the same assembly component or mesh part.
From the
Interactions section of the
action bar,
click
Contact Detection
.
Choose the
Search domain:
Whole
Model: Search all components in the assembly for contacting
surfaces. This is the default if you do not select any geometry.
Click individual
components in the model to select candidate geometry supports. Contact is
considered only between the selected components. If you select a single
component, contact features are considered between surfaces on the selected
component and any other contacting surfaces in the model.
Select mesh
parts from the
tree
or from the view. When you select mesh parts along with
Detect interactions on:Mesh, surface-based contacts are created
only between the selected mesh parts.
Optional:
Change the default Search tolerance, which defines the
maximum separation distance between potential contacting surfaces.
If two surfaces are closer to each other than the search tolerance that you
specify, the app considers these two surfaces to be in contact with each other.
Optional:
Select
Tie surfaces together to create contact
features that tie the surfaces together; no relative motion between the
surfaces will occur at contacting interfaces during the
simulation.
Note:
The
Tie surfaces together option is not
available in thermal simulation steps.
Click
Find Surface Pairs.
A separate dialog box shows the surface pair detection progress.
When completed, a table displays candidate contact features for surfaces that
meet the detection requirements. You can edit these contact features as
necessary:
Right-click on any row in the table to
Locate,
Edit, or
Remove that contact feature. You can also
choose
Invert Selection to select the other
contact features in the table.
Note:
If you select
Edit from the context menu, the
Surface-Based Contact dialog box opens
to let you enter parameters for all of the selected contact features. These
options are described in
Surface-based Contact Options.
Select multiple rows in the table
([Ctrl]+[Click] or
[Shift]+[Click]) and then choose
Edit,
Merge, or
Remove for those features. Again you can
choose
Invert Selection to select the other
contact features in the table.
Optional:
You can change the search domain or tolerance and click
Find Surface Pairs again to change the search
criteria. Any new surface pairs found are marked by an asterisk (*) in the
table.