Find and Display Entities

Find and display entities based on their connectivity or proximity to other selected entities.

From the View Controls toolbar, click .
From the guide bar, choose the output entity type.
Choose the desired function: Attached to, Nearby, or Shared by.
Select the input entities to execute the Find operation.

Tip: The find function executes automatically whenever a selection is made. To do this manually, click

to disable automatic mode and execute the find operation by clicking

Attached To Function

The Attached to function finds entities that are attached or connected to the selected FE or geometry entities.

For example, finding surfaces that are attached to the selected surfaces.

- Display the next layer of connected entities.
- Find all entities connected to the selected entities. This is equivalent to clicking repeatedly on till there are no more entities that are connected to the selected entities.
- Save the found entities to the user mark. Saved selections can retrieved later by right-clicking and selecting Select > Retrieve Selection from the context menu.

Restriction:

and

are only enabled when the output and input entity types match. For example, finding surfaces attached to selected surfaces.

The Attached to function can also be used to find entities that are not the same as the input entity. For example, Figure 2 shows components attached to the selected connectors are found.

Nearby Function

The Nearby function finds entities that are near the selected entities, within a specified distance that can be modified in the Radius input field.

The default radius value is 10. Click Entities to display and select from the output entity list.

In the example shown in Figure 3, all the FE, along with the connectors, loads, and systems that are within a search radius of 50 of the selected elements are found.

Shared By Function

The Shared by function finds entities that are shared by two or more selected entities.

In the example shown in Figure 4, the nodes shared between the two selected components are found.

Options

Action: Choose between the action of showing or isolating the entities that are found.
Show IDs: Enable to show the IDs of the found entities. Disable to clear IDs.
Highlight found entities: When the action is set to Show, this option highlights the found entities.
Note: Only applicable when Attached to is selected.
Save input selection to mark: Save the input selection to mark along with the found entities.
Include tied contact: Include tied contacts when checking for tied connectivity.
Note: Only available in the Abaqus, LS-DYNA, OptiStruct, PAM-CRASH, and Radioss profiles.
Check projection: Check for tied projection.
Note: Only available in the Abaqus, LS-DYNA, OptiStruct, PAM-CRASH, and Radioss profiles.
Include constraints: Include constraints when checking for FE connectivity.
Include rigid bodies: Include rigid bodies when checking for FE connectivity.
Note: Only available in the OptiStruct and Abaqus profiles.
Include constrained rigid bodies: Include the keyword CONSTRAINED_RIGID_BODIES when checking for FE connectivity.
Note: Only available in the LS-DYNA profile.
Include constrained extra nodes: Include the keyword CONSTRAINED_EXTRA_NODES when checking for FE connectivity.
Note: Only available in the LS-DYNA profile.
Include LINKS: Include Plinks, Llinks, Elinks, and Slinks elements when checking for FE connectivity.
Note: Only available in the PAM-CRASH profile.
Include realized FE: Find both connectors and realized FE.
Free edges: Find surface edges when finding lines.
Shared edges: Find shared edges when finding lines.
Non-manifold edges: Find non-manifold edges when finding lines.
Suppressed edges: Find suppressed edges when finding lines.
Found nodes: Choose between adding found nodes to mark or marking them as temp nodes.
Search method: Choose between the search method of Sphere or Box, while finding nearby entities.