Define Abaqus 2D element material orientation

This topic describes how to use Mesh Associated Data to define material orientation for all 2D elements in a mesh.

1. Display the FEM.

2. In the Simulation Navigator, expand the mesh collector that contains your 2D mesh.

3. Right-click the mesh and choose Edit Mesh Associated Data.

4. In the Mesh Associated Data dialog box, from the Material Orientation Method list, select the desired method for defining the orientation. Physical Property Table Tangent Curve Vector Regardless of the method you choose, when you define the material orientation vector for shell elements, you rotate only the X and Y axes in the plane of the element. The Z-axis is fixed and is normal to the element. The orthogonality of X, Y, and Z means you only need to orient the X-axis. The right-hand rule applies.

5. In the Preview group, select the Preview check box to view the material coordinate system for each element in the graphics window.

6. Click OK to finish defining the material orientation.

Physical Property Table method

Selecting Physical Property Table specifies that the material orientation defined in the mesh's physical property table will be used. To define the material orientation in the physical property table:

1. Choose Home tab→Properties group→Physical Properties .

2. From the list, select the physical property table to which your 2D mesh is assigned.

3. Click Edit .

4. In the Properties group, select Set Material Orientation.

5. From the Material Orientation Vector list, select the desired method.User Defined — Lets you select or define a coordinate system using the standard coordinate system definition tools.Inherited from Layup — Specifies that the material orientation is defined under the Layups node in the Simulation Navigator.Note: This option is only applicable when you are using the ply-based process to define your laminate. See Laminate definition methods for more information.

6. From the Material Orientation Type list, select or define the material coordinate system using the standard coordinate system definition tools.

7. Click OK.

8. Click Close.

Tangent Curve method

1. In the graphics window, select a curve or edge on your geometry. For each element, the software finds the closest point on the selected curve or edge to the element centroid and sets the primary direction as tangent to that geometry.In the following example, the material orientation represented by the yellow arrows was defined by selecting the curved edge . Note: The arrows shown in the picture are displayed using the Element Material Orientation command.

2. (Optional) Enter an angle in the Rotation Angle box to rotate the initial direction of the material vector. Continuing with the previous example, an angle of 45 degrees results in the following vector.

Vector method

1. Define the material orientation vector using one of these methods:Select an edge in the geometry to infer a vector.Use the vector tools to define the vector.**Vector inferred from edge (1)**Vector specified as X direction

2. (Optional) Click Reverse Direction to reverse the direction of the material orientation vector.

3. (Optional) Enter an angle in the Rotation Angle box to rotate the initial direction of the material orientation vector.

How do I

View material orientation graphically

Define Nastran 2D element material orientation

Define Nastran 3D element material orientation

Define Abaqus 3D element material orientation

Define ANSYS 2D element material orientation

Define ANSYS 3D element material orientation

Define LS-DYNA 2D element material orientation

Define LS-DYNA 3D element material orientation

Define 2D element material orientation (Simcenter 3D Thermal/Flow, Electronic Systems Cooling, and Space Systems Thermal)

Define 3D element material orientation (Simcenter 3D Thermal/Flow, Electronic Systems Cooling, and Space Systems Thermal)

Define the material orientation for elements (Simcenter Samcef)

Define 2D element material orientation (Simcenter Samcef)

Define orthotropic thermal conductivity in a cylindrical mesh (Simcenter 3D Thermal/Flow, Electronic Systems Cooling, and Space Systems Thermal)

Learn more

Material orientation

Quick links

Command reference

Pre/Post video examples

Bulk Entry Descriptions

Simcenter 3D tutorials

Browse Simcenter 3D help by product area

Define Abaqus 2D element material orientation, Simcenter 3D 2021.1 Series

© 2020 Siemens

window.mainLanguage="en_US"

window.delivId=""

window.projectId=""

MathJax.Hub.Config({ TeX: { extensions: ["autoload-all.js"] }, tex2jax: { displayMath: [ ] }, "SVG": { scale: 125 } });