Towards semantic-based 3D mesh modeling

Nowadays, most of the numerical simulations in product maintenance are carried out by several loops of the following steps: 1) CAD model creation/optimization, 2) Finite Element (FE) mesh generation, 3) insertion of semantic data for physical simulation (e.g. material behavior laws, boundary conditions) and 4) FE simulation and analysis of the results. The four steps are repeated for the evaluation of each conceived maintenance solution. The semantic data are attached to the mesh through the use of groups of mesh entities sharing the same semantic characteristics. Thus, any modification of the CAD model always implies an update of the mesh as well as an update of the attached semantic data. This is time-consuming and thus not suitable for industrial maintenance. Moreover, the CAD models do not always exist and should therefore be reconstructed starting from scratch or from the scanned physical object. In this paper, we propose a framework towards the definition of semantics based CAD-less operators wherein semantic enriched meshes are manipulated directly. This work also finds interest in the preliminary design phases where alternative solutions have to be quickly evaluate