nTopology 3.22 is here! This release features a new option for four different Cell Map blocks to have either Linear or Curved edges. We deprecated the Closest Point block to upgrade and replace it with the new Closest Point to Body block. Along with these changes, we have addressed several bugs to offer a better experience using nTopology. As with every release, nTopology’s dedicated support team is ready to answer your questions. Please visit support.ntopology.com to gain access to helpful tutorials and support articles.

• Linear or Curved Option released for four Cell Map Blocks

• Block Updates

• Bug Fixes

Linear or Curved Option released for four Cell Map Blocks

• You now have the ability to select curved or straight edges on Cell Maps. This option is available for the following Cell Map blocks:
  • Cylindrical Cell Map (Beta)
  • Spherical Cell Map (Beta)
  • Cell Map on CAD Face (Beta)
  • Cell Map between CAD Faces (Beta)

This feature is especially useful when using the blocks Cell Map on CAD Face and Cell Map between CAD Faces when your CAD Face(s) have a high degree of curvature. Unchecking the Linear option creates a Cell Map with curved edges that will better conform with CAD Face(s).

By default, the Cylindrical and Spherical Maps will output a curved Cell Map:

View of a Cylindrical Cell Map with Linear selected:

Lattice results from the Periodic Lattice Body block and Simple cubic Unit Cell when Linear is unchecked (left) vs checked (right):

A Lattice generated from using the Cell Map on CAD Face block with Linear unchecked:

Block Updates

• The Closest Point block has been depreciated and replaced with a new version, and the block has been renamed to Closest Point to Body. The new version has a more robust and performant algorithm, and an overload that utilizes parallel processing to improve the performance when the input is a Point List.

Bug Fixes

• We fixed an issue in the Cell Map on CAD Face (Beta) block that was generating an incomplete Cell Map with missing cells. The issue was occurring when a low value was provided for the U and W cell counts.

• We fixed an issue with a block rebuilding when it is moved from a Section to a Model Input.
• We fixed an issue with being able to import a Custom Block that’s missing inputs instead of receiving an import error message.
• We fixed an issue where you can’t move blocks from the Model Input section to another Section if they contain nested levels of inputs.
• We fixed an issue with blocks being run in Manual Run mode having two progress bar icons instead of one.
• We fixed an issue where loads applied to hex meshes are not exported properly to an Abaqus(.inp) file.
• We fixed an issue where an analysis study with an orthotropic material exported to an Abaqus (.inp) file failed to run in Abaqus.
• We updated an error message for Modal Analysis to clearly describe Density as a required parameter to run the analysis.
• We fixed an issue where using an Orthotropic Material in an analysis yields unexpected results because the Shear modulus and Poisson’s ratio input parameters were switched. Please re-run any analysis that uses an Orthotropic Material to confirm correct results.