| Mesh Generation > Surface Mesh Generation |
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A surface mesh is a mesh generated on a planar or a curved surface region, and is used for
| modeling a 2-dimensional domain such as a plane or an axisymmetric solid. | |
| modeling a curved surface domain such as shell. | |
| a seed mesh for generating a volume mesh. |
A surface mesh consists of planar or curved surface elements which are either triangular or quadrilateral. There are many methods for generating a surface mesh. They can be classified into the following 5 categories:
| automatic triangulation | |
| mapping | |
| sweeping | |
| duplication | |
| projection |
There are a few methods in each category, as described in the following sections. VisualFEA supports 4 types of surface elements, which may be used in surface meshes. Each of these element types may be defined on planes or on curved surfaces. The types of surface elements are shown in the following table. You may select one of these types to be adopted in mesh generation using the corresponding dialog box.
< Element types in surface meshes >
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