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Operation |
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The following is a summary of how Clear calculates minimum clearance values between two structures. The process begins with you, the user, identifying the region over which interference can occur by defining two element sets, one on each of the structures under consideration. In addition, you also specify the value of a parameter named Number of Points per Element. This determines the number of points at which the program actually performs interference calculations, as follows.
At a particular analysis time, Clear begins at the first point on the first element of the first element set, and calculates the distance between this point and every point of the second set. The minimum predicted distance is stored for subsequent processing, and Clear moves to the second point on the first element of the first element set. This procedure is repeated for all points on all elements of the first element set.
It is important to realise from this that Clear considers that interference can occur between any two points in the two element sets that you identify. You should be careful in defining interference regions to specify reasonable data to prevent excessive runtimes, by ensuring the program is not checking interference between points which will never approach. It is better to perform a series of Clear runs for a succession of smaller interference regions, rather than try to do everything in one run.
•*ELEMENT SETS is used to specify data relating to the element sets on both structures between which Clear is to perform clearance calculations.