Element3D Parameter

WARNING

GSA-Grasshopper plugin [GsaGH] is pre-release and under active development, including further testing to be undertaken. It is provided "as-is" and you bear the risk of using it. Future versions may contain breaking changes. Any files, results, or other types of output information created using GsaGH should not be relied upon without thorough and independent checking.

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Description

Elements in GSA are geometrical objects used for Analysis. Elements must be split at intersections with other elements to connect to them or 'node out'.

In GsaGH, an Element3D is a collection of 3D Elements (mesh solids) used for the FE analysis. In GSA, a 3D Element is just a single closed mesh, but to speed things up inside Rhino (mainly for display reasons) we have made the Element3D parameter an Ngon mesh (opens new window) that can contain more than one closed mesh.

GSA Reference

GSA Elements

Properties

Icon	Name	Description
	IDs	List of GSA Element Numbers (default = 0). The values will automatically be set when assembling a Model, but you can override this by setting them to anything but zero.
	Ngon Mesh	Elements' geometrical definition represented by a Rhino Ngon Mesh (opens new window) You can display Ngon meshes in Grasshopper but not create them natively.
	3D Property	List of 3D Propertys (also known as PV in GSA).
	Type	List of Element Types; Tetra4, Pyramid5, Wedge6 or Brick8 depending on the Ngon mesh definition.
	Group	List of Element Group numbers.
	Name	List of Element Names.
	Colour	List of Element Colours.
	Dummy	List of Element Dummy status.