11.5. Monitor Plots related to Rigid Bodies

Using CFX-Pre, you can set up monitors that track the rigid body state by using CEL expressions that access the rigid body state variables. For details, see CEL Access of the Rigid Body State Variables, Setting up Monitors in the CFX-Pre User's Guide, and Convergence History Plots and User Point Plots in the CFX-Solver Manager User's Guide. When you run the simulation, these monitors will be plotted on the User Points tab in CFX-Solver Manager.

When you run a simulation that involves a rigid body, you can see the following built-in monitor plots (in addition to any user point plots you have set up in CFX-Pre):

  • Rigid Body Convergence

    This plot appears on the Rigid Body Convergence tab. If this tab is not available, select the following menu item in CFX-Solver Manager: Monitors > Rigid Body > Rigid Body Convergence.

  • Rigid Body Euler Angles

    This plot shows, by default, the Euler angles describing the orientation of the rigid body with respect to the global coordinate frame.

    This plot appears on the Rigid Body Euler Angles tab. To see this plot, select the following menu item in CFX-Solver Manager: Monitors > Rigid Body > Rigid Body Euler Angles.

  • Rigid Body Position

    This plot shows the position of the center of mass of the rigid body with respect to the global coordinate frame.

    This plot appears on the Rigid Body Position tab. To see this plot, select the following menu item in CFX-Solver Manager: Monitors > Rigid Body > Rigid Body Position.

In each of these plots, you can edit the monitor properties (for example, by right-clicking in the plot and selecting Monitor Properties from the shortcut menu) to change which plot line variables are plotted. Not all of the variables pertaining to rigid bodies appear in the built-in plots by default; some plot line variables must be manually selected in order for them to appear in a plot. For example to plot the components of angular acceleration, angular velocity, linear acceleration, or linear velocity of a rigid body, you would have to edit the monitor properties of a plot and select the corresponding plot line variables.


Note:  All of the plot line variables pertaining to a rigid body are with respect to the global coordinate frame.