While this may be a strange question it is directly related to star-cd. We use Pro/E for our drafting, so I use it for solid modeling. Does anyone know of an easy way to take a solid part (or assembly) and end up with just the fluid volume around it so that it can be meshed? Even a link for something on the web would be helpful. Thanks.

If you got the solid mesh! You can use so other software to generation the mesh! just like ICEMCFD or Promodel! It's soon to generation the mesh of fluid!

can pro/e write parasolid-format? stardesign can read it! in stardesign you can generate tet-meshes fully automatic (with prism-layer). stardesign comes with the starsuite. so, please check out!

test the star-plugin for pro/e!!! it cost not much, and you can generate mesh with pro/e

I´m not a ProE expert, but I think you should use the cutout operation in ProE. You have to model a new solid part and then use a cutout to subtract your part/assy from it. Hope it helps!

My company uses ProE for solid models & drafting. The easiest path to success depends upon the nature of the model.

Using my limited ProE skills, most of the time I will make a copy of the surfaces I want, IGES them out and use ProSurf/ProAM to clean/stitch the surfaces. Alternatively, I'll IGES out the entire part & then delete unwanted surfaces in ProSurf.

However, sometimes its just easier to create a dedicated piece of geometry inside ProE. It depends upon how many unwanted features (i.e. small fillets & chamfers) you try to supress only to find a failed regeneration lurking around the corner.

ProE plug-ins for meshing are essentially useless untill you have a solid part which represents your fluid domain.

Tom

To take a part which is the solid and extract either the fluid inside it or outside it (or both) you can use the proe cut-out facility. I cut and paste from the star-proe help which I can email you if interested.

Creating Cut-Outs Often, a model may be the inverse of what you want, i.e. you have a model of a car but you want to calculate the flow over the it. To do this assemblies are again used and the process is much like merging parts. This example is provided with your STAR-Pro/E distribution. The files are called car.prt, tunnel.prt and carintunnel.asm.

1) First build a part that is the size of "box" of fluid you want to put the car in

In the example this has been done for you, the file is called tunnel.prt.

2) Build an assembly that contains both the car and the "box"

In the example this has been done for you, the file is called carintunnel.asm.

From the picture below you can see that the car model is a model of a real 3d car, but in CFD a symmetry plane can be used to reduce model size. Therefore the fluid part for this cutout only covers half of the car.

3) Create a cut out

Assembly -> Component -> Adv Utils -> Cut Out

Now pick the part that you want to remove material from (the tunnel in the example). It will turn red. Press Done Sel.

Then pick the part you are using to make the cutout (the car in the example). It will turn red. Press Done Sel

Finally press Done to the last options panel.

4) Open the fluid model

The fluid model (tunnel.prt) will now have the cut out of the car within it.

The fluid part is now suitable for use within STAR-Pro/E

Gentlemen, thanks for your help on this matter. I have used Philip's method and it works extremely well. It works for in just Pro/E and then the iges file can be written and used in Pro*surf. Even I could figure it out. I thank you all!! I have avoided using the STAR-Pro/E package because my Pro/E and STAR-CD are on different machines with different operating systems.

Tom