Import named surfaces

[Akoubdmado]

Hi,
I'm trying to import named surfaces from CAD software (NX) into pyMAPDL. I haven't figured out how to do this directly, so I've been using pyprime Mesh as an intermediary that creates named components directly in pyMAPDL. However, I'm now running into problems with setting cyclic boundary conditions on the imported db.
So, I'm wondering if there's a way of importing named components directly into pyMADPL?

[mikerife]

Hi @Akoubdmado
Normally the answer is no, that was one of the "killer applications" that WB Mechanical introduced compared to Mechanical APDL. However the answer is sort of with respect to NX import into MAPDL. The import results in a partname.tbl file, where partname is the name of the NX prt imported. This tbl file has the mapping of the NX object names and the corresponding MAPDL entity ID numbers. Please see the following Mechanical Help for more information:

Mechanical APDL Help -> Connection User's Guide -> 2.5 Importing UG/NX

You should be able to write a parser in Python to open the file and find the NX components and the MAPDL entity ID.

Mike

[Akoubdmado]

Thanks for your reply @mikerife , I used to avoid the .prt format because when importing a part designed in mm, it appeared as "meters" in pyMAPDL.
The only format I have found to be correctly dimensioned is Parasolid. Do you know of any way of changing this?

[germa89]

Check this: https://mapdl.docs.pyansys.com/version/stable/mapdl_commands/prep7/_autosummary/ansys.mapdl.core.Mapdl.vlscale.html#ansys.mapdl.core.Mapdl.vlscale

[mikerife]

Hi @Akoubdmado & @germa89 MAPDL does not have a NX prt file reader per se; it relies on NX to send it information during the importing of the prt file. That's why NX has to be installed. I don't know why NX sends the prt in meters. Parasolid is always saved in meters but MAPDL will auto-scale by 10 or 100 if the dimensions are small and the import may fail. If the scale factor is used it will be echoed in the MAPDL output.

I think the better option would be to close this issue and have you open an new discussion on why setting cyclic BC's are failing.

Mike