Analyst Tree-Display

Analyst Tree-Display allows you to configure the display of your model in the Viewer.

You can enable or disable the display of geometries, particles, contacts, bonds, or selection groups (including bins and bin groups). Also, you can color all the stated elements according to the available attributes for each of them.

Displaying the Geometries Subsection

You can visualize Cylindrical Periodic Boundary conditions from the Geometries section.

The Geometries subsection allows you to modify and configure the display settings for all the Geometries in the simulation alternatively. If expanded, You can configure the details for each of the geometries in the simulation.

The options include the following:

  1. The Display checkbox allows you to enable or disable the display of the selected section or selection.
  2. Display Mode allows you to select between filled, mesh, or point style display. The mesh option can be used to display the triangular elements the section is made up of. The points option shows the vertex of each element.
    Filled Geometry

Points Geometry

  • Opacity allows you to set the opacity level from 0 (fully transparent) to 1 (opaque).

Opacity of 1

Opacity of 0.75

Opacity of 0.25

 

  • Texture loads an image file (*.png, *.bmp or *.jpg) to use as a texture on geometry surfaces.

  • Color By Uniform colors the selected geometry or geometries will be colored as a whole by one color.

 

  • Color By - Attribute colors geometry by attribute which is often unique to the geometry element such as its ID or current force.
Element Attribute Components
Geometry Center of Mass Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Compressive Force N/A
ID     N/A
Pressure     N/A
Torque (element)     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Total force Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Velocity     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Velocity Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Custom Property  Depends on the number of elements
Area N/A

The attributes are Compressive Force, ID, Pressure, Torque, Total Force, or Velocity. The torque selection is the Torque on the individual triangular geometry element based around the position of the contact point relative to the element center point. Selected geometry or geometries will all be colored based on their element attributes. The resolution of the coloring depends on the geometry Mesh resolution.

Geometry shown as few mesh triangles, the coloring is split over the the small number of triangles

Geometry shown as a large number of mesh triangles can be seen, the coloring can be shown per triangle.

  1. Smooth Colors
    Coloring of geometry attributes can be smoothed to better visualize the color gradation. With Geometry selected from the Element pulldown, select an attribute to color and then select Smooth Colors. Without color smoothing enabled, each geometry triangle is displayed with one color only. With smoothing enabled, the color across each triangle is interpolated based on the value of the attribute at the nodes.
  2. Selecting Multiple Geometries
    Multiple geometries can be selected by using Ctrl + Left mouse click and selecting each geometry.  When selected, the display Mode and coloring can be modified for the selected group rather than having to modify each geometry individually.

Display Particles Subsection

The Particles subsection allows you to modify and configure the display settings for all the Particles and Particle Types in the simulation. This can be for all particles or can be expanded to select individual particle types. The particle types refer to those defined in the Creator Tree > Bulk Material > Material > Particle section.

  1. The Display checkbox allows you to enable or disable the display of the selected particle types.
  2. Representation allows you to represent particles: either default, cone, vector, stream, or template. Click Options to configure further display attributes.
Option Description
Default

By default, particles are displayed as they were defined in the Creator.
Cone

Particles are displayed as cones. The direction, length and base width of the cone can be set to represent a variety of particle attributes..

  1. Direction
    Represents velocity, torque, total force, angular velocity, or custom property (consisting of exactly three values).

  2. Length
    Represents: velocity, total force, moment of inertia, kinetic energy, mass, rotational kinetic energy, compressive force, torque, volume, angular velocity, or a custom particle property.

  3. Base width
    Can represent: velocity, total force, compressive force, torque, mass, kinetic energy, rotational kinetic energy, volume, moment of inertia, angular velocity, charge, electrostatic force, or a custom particle property.

  4. Particle display reverts to standard spheres when EDEM cannot show particles as cones (for example, if the selected attribute has no values).
Vector

Particles are displayed as vectors. The direction and length of the vector can be set to represent a variety of particle attributes.

  1. Direction
    Can represent: velocity, torque, total force or angular velocity, or custom property (consisting of exactly three values).
  2. Length
    Can represent: velocity, total force, moment of inertia, kinetic energy, mass, rotational kinetic energy, compressive force, torque, volume, angular velocity, or a custom particle property.
Steam

 

The path of the particle is displayed as a stream with variable coloring.

  1. Number of Steps
    Define the number of time steps the particles should be streamed for. The number indicates that the streams will be drawn for the previous n time steps up to and including the current Time Step.

  2. Stream All Steps

    Streams are drawn across all Time Steps. 

  3. Stream Fade

    Fades the color intensity of the streams.

Template

Particles are displayed using one of the currently imported templates.

 

  1. Texture loads an image file (*.png, *.bmp or *.jpg) to use as a texture on particle surfaces. Textures can only be loaded on to particle surfaces when the particle representation type is set to Template.

  2. Opacity sets the particle opacity level from 0 (fully transparent) to 1 (opaque). Select the Opacity check box and set the value of opacity to between 0 and 1.
    Example of particles colored by Velocity with Opacity set to 0.25:

  3. Color By - Uniform allows you to color the selected particle or particles as a whole by one color.
    Uniform coloring can be used to set the standard color for any element. The image on the left shows particles in three separate selection groups each colored differently using the Uniform color option.

    Color By - Attribute allows you to color any particle of the model by a particular attribute: For example, the following figure shows all particles colored by velocity. The particles with the greatest velocity are colored red, and those with the lowest colored blue.

  4. Select the element to color from Color By selection, then select the attribute to color by.
    The attributes and their components available for each element are listed in the table below.

     

Element Attribute Component
Particle Angular Velocity Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Axial Stress Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Compressive Force N/A
Coordination Number    N/A
Diameter (Multi-Sphere)     N/A
Moment of Inertia   Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Kinetic Energy   N/A
Length. (Polyhedral) N/A
Mass     N/A
Moment of Inertia   Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Position     X, Y, Z
Potential Energy N/A
Residence Time    N/A
Rotational Kinetic Energy N/A
Stress Tensor XX, XY, XZ, YX, YY, YZ, ZX, ZY, ZZ
Torque     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Total Energy N/A
Total Force    Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Velocity     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Volume     N/A
Von Mises    N/A
Custom property Depends on the number of elements.
Frozen     1 - Frozen, 0 - Not frozen

Log Scaling Coloring

Coloring of particle attributes can be scaled logarithmically for better color distribution. This feature allows you to change the coloring from linear to logarithmic and is active for particle Mass and Volume only.

With Particles selected from the Element pulldown, select an attribute to color by Mass or Volume then select the Log Scale checkbox.

Displaying Selections Subsection

This subsection, if expanded, shows Geometry and Particle Selections. As default no selections are available, these have to be first configured in the Analyst Tree > Setup Selections area. Once set up, the following display options are available:

  1. Properties by Selection Group checkbox

    For selections, enable or disable if the properties are set for each selection group. This works with the display and color by checkboxes.

  2. Display checkbox

    Enables or disables the display of the selection. For example, if a Manual Selection of particles is highlighted as shown, you can choose to display or hide this selection.

    Display box selected

Display box not selected

Display Mode

  1. For equipment, select filled, mesh, or point style display. For particles, select default, cone, vector, stream, or template.

Selected group of particles displayed by Vector while remaining particles shown as default:

  1. Color by Selection Group checkbox
    If enabled, you can color only the selection group following the Coloring settings.

Meta-particles

Analysis of Meta particles can now be performed to understand certain attributes associated with them. The analysis considers a meta particle based on its current state in the simulation. Once a Meta-Particle breaks it forms two Meta-Particles. For this analysis all single particles are considered Meta-Particles.

You can perform analysis on Meta-Particles based on the following attributes:

•    Length (bounding box, extent or distance based)
•    Mass
•    Number of Particles
•    Volume
•    Position
•    Number of Elements

Definitions

Length Bounding Box

The bounding box method creates a bounding box around the Meta-Particle and then calculates the diagonal for that box.

Length Extent

The extent based method adds the length or diameter of each element in the system. This is good for long continuous meta particles. This method assumes that sphero-cylinders are bonded end to end.

Length Distance-based

 

 

The length-based approach takes the two further-apart particles and calculates the distance between those two particles.

Known Issues

  • Selections are not supported for Meta-Particle Analysis.
  • All elements in the simulation are analysed, regardless of whether they are part of the Meta-Particle. 

Display Contact Subsection

You can independently examine the contacts between different types of particles and between particles and individual sections of geometry. Use the Particle and Contact with dropdowns to select a pair of elements. Particles can contact with other particle types or equipment types.

Display Contact checkbox

Displays the contacts in the Viewer. Also, display contacts can result in slow graphics performance.

Standard particle displayed

 

           Particles not displayed and all contacts are displayed

  1. Display Contact Attributes

    1. Contact Vector
      Displays an equal sized cylinder between all elements selected.

    2. Normal Force
      Scales the contact vector option by the magnitude of the contact normal force.

    3. Normal Overlap
      Represents the contact as a flat plate between the elements.

    4. Tangential Force
      Scales the contact by the magnitude of the contact tangential force.

    5. Display Contact Opacity
      Change the opacity of the contact display.Display Contact Coloring

  2. If you select Color by Uniform, the contact group or groups will be visualized by the defined color.
    Particle-particle contacts colored yellow with particle-geometry contacts colored purple.

 

 

If Contact Color by Attribute is used to color any contact pair by a particular attribute, the available options are as follows:

Element Attribute Components
Contact Contact Normal (Polyhedral) Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Contact Vector 1     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Contact Vector 2     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Normal Force     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Normal Overlap     N/A
Overlap Volume (Polyhedral)     N/A
Penetration Depth (Polyhedral)     N/A
Tangential Force     Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Tangential Overlap     N/A
Custom Property     Depends on the number of elements

Display Bonds Subsection

EDEM has two Bonded models - an updated Bonding V2 model and Legacy Bonding model.

Bonding V2 Model

Bonds are calculated through Custom Contacts. To display bond information for the V2 model this can be shown through the Analyst Tree > Display > Contact option and select the pair of elements to display.

The following information can then be displayed (Color by) or exported:

  1. Bond Status (0,1, or 2)
    1. 0 indicates no bond has been created
    2. 1 indicates an active bond is in place between the elements
    3. 2 indicates a bond has been broken
  2. NormBondForce Component (0, 1, 2)
    1. NormBondForce Component 0 is the X component of the bond normal force.
    2. NormBondForce Component 1 is the Y component of the bond normal force.
    3. NormBondForce Component 2 is the Z component of the bond normal force.
  3. NormBondTorque
    1. NormBondTorque Component 0 is the X component of the bond normal Torque.
    2. NormBondTorque Component 1 is the Y component of the bond normal Torque.
    3. NormBondTorque Component 2 is the Z component of the bond normal Torque.
  4. RandomBondStiffnessValue
    1. A random value between -1 and +1 assigned to each bond. The bond stiffness used is the RandomBondStiffnessValue * Bond Stiffness Range * Bond Stiffness Value
  5. TangBondForce Component (0, 1, 2)
    1. TangBondForce Component 0 is the X component of the bond tangential force.
    2. TangBondForce Component 1 is the Y component of the bond tangential force.
    3. TangBondForce Component 2 is the Z component of the bond tangential force.
  6. TangBondTorque
    1. TangBondTorqueComponent 0 is the X component of the bond tangential Torque.
    2. TangBondTorque Component 1 is the Y component of the bond tangential Torque.
    3. TangBondTorque Component 2 is the Z component of the bond tangential Torque.

Bonding Model (legacy)

The Analyst Tree displays bonds in the Analyst > Display > Bonds section.

  1. Display Bonds Bond State

    Selects the Bond State (either Intact Bond or Broken Bond).  Use the dropdown lists to choose a particle type and another particle type to bond with.

  2. Display Bond Checkbox

    Enables the Display option to show the bonds in the Viewer.

  3. Display Bonds Display Attribute

    For broken bonds, set the distance threshold to define the distance between the center of particles before broken bonds are no longer displayed.
    The display can represent the following attributes:

    1. Normal Force

    2. Normal Moment

    3. Tangential Force

    4. Tangential Moment

  4. Display Bonds Opacity

    Changes the opacity of the Bond display.

  5. Display Bonds Coloring

If you select color by Uniform, the selected bond group or groups will be visualized by the defined color. Attribute coloring is used to color any bond pair by a particular attribute. The available options are:

Element Attribute Components
Bond Normal force Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Normal moment Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Tangential force Magnitude, X, Y, Z
Tangential moment Magnitude, X, Y, Z

Color by: Attributes

Within the display options, Geometries, Particles, Selections, Contacts, and Bonds can be colored by their individual attributes.  A color can be assigned for the minimum, median and maximum values. Elements will be colored depending on whereabouts in the range they fall.

The value range is determined by setting the minimum and maximum attribute values. The values can be entered directly or can be read from the model by clicking the update buttons. This takes the current maximum and minimum values of the selected attribute from the model. If the auto-update options are selected these values will update according to which Time Step is being viewed.

Attribute coloring can only be viewed when the current Time Step is either a full save or a partial save that includes the required attribute.

Coloring Levels

Select the desired number of coloring levels from the dropdown list to use in the attribute coloring analysis.

You can customize the colors from all the levels as convenient. 3, 5, 7, and 9 color levels are available.

This enables coloring not to be set outside a min:max range. For example, if using 7 color levels, the minimum two colors can be set to the same value (white or light grey) and the remaining coloring set to bands to just highlight the higher values.

Min Value defines the value of the selected attribute that is going to correspond to the color assigned for the minimum in the legend.

Max Value defines the value of the selected attribute that is going to correspond to the color assigned for the maximum in the legend.

Auto Update enables the checkbox to allow EDEM define the minimum/maximum values depending on the calculated results.

Hide out of bounds hides all the particles when Auto Update is not enabled, and if the value of the attribute colored is outside of the minimum and maximum range.

Coloring Legend

Allows you to display a color legend in the Viewer.

  • Select Position Legend and click anywhere in the Viewer to position it.
  • Click Legend Options to set the legend’s width, height, number of intervals, alignment, and title.

Select Hide Legends to remove legends for all selected elements.

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