18.11. Saving and Managing Results

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Saving Files

There are three ways to save your results in the Mechanical application:

  • As a Mechanical APDL application database file.

    To save the Mechanical application results in a Mechanical APDL application database file, click Analysis Settings on the Outline and in its Details, click Yes next to Save Ansys db under Analysis Data Management.

  • As an input file for the Mechanical APDL application. See Writing and Reading the Mechanical APDL Application Files.

  • As a Mechanical application database file.

    To save your solution as a Mechanical application database file, select File> Export. Select File> Save As in the Project Schematic to save the project. The Save As dialog box appears, allowing you to type the name of the file and specify its location.

Note:  The application creates reference files that contain analysis information that is read back into the application during solution processing. Certain textual characters can create issues during this reading process. Avoid the use of the following unsupported characters in your file naming conventions and file path definition:

  • Quote character (“)

  • Ampersand (&)

  • Apostrophe (‘)

  • Greater than and less than characters (< >)

  • Japanese and Chinese characters

Managing Files

During the solution, several files are created. Some of these can be deleted after the solution but some need to be retained for postprocessing or for feeding other subsequent analyses. Since you can perform several different analyses on a single model or even have several models in the same Mechanical application project, you must manage the solution files in a consistent and predictable manner.

Note:  If you open a solved project and make a change to either the geometry or the mesh, Mechanical automatically deletes the content of the original project files (*.rst, *.out, etc.).

Consistent Directory Structure for Mechanical Application Analyses

Ansys Workbench's file management system keeps multiple databases under a single project. See Saving and Managing Project Files for a description of the file management system.

Note:  The Analysis Settings Details view has an Analysis Data Management grouping that shows the solution directory location for each analysis.

Solution Files

Default behavior: By default an analysis in the Mechanical application saves only the minimal files required for postprocessing. Typically these include results files (file.rst, file.rth, file.rmg, file.psd, file.mcom), input file (ds.dat), output file (solve.out), and some other files that have valuable information about the solution ( file.BCS, file.nlh, file.gst). Of these only the results file is generally of significant size.

For Windows users, the solution files folder can be displayed using the Open Solver Files Directory feature.

Future Analysis: If the results of this analysis are to be used as a load or an initial condition in a subsequent analysis then additional files may need to be saved. Declaring your intent to use this in the future will automatically save the required files and reuse them in the subsequent analysis. Refer to Define Initial Conditions for details of these analyses.

Delete Unneeded Files: The solution process creates other files that are typically not needed for postprocessing or are not used in subsequent analyses. By default, the Mechanical application deletes these files at the end of solution. However, if for any reason, you want to keep all the files you could choose to do so.

You can use the Output Controls on the analysis settings page to write only the desired result types to the .rst file (for example, if strains are not needed, you can turn them off which would create a smaller result file). In addition, for advanced Mechanical APDL application users, Command objects can be used to further limit output via the OUTRES command.

An external result file is needed to post results. The following behavior will occur:

  • If you save a simulation, any simulation files (result and other required files) will be saved to the new location.

  • If you use the Duplicate Without Results option (Environment and Model objects only), all subordinate objects are reproduced with the exception of the data for all result objects. This is based on the intention that loading changes are performed and the solution process is repeated.

  • If you attempt to resolve a previously solved and saved database, the corresponding saved result files are backed up automatically in case the current solve is not saved.

  • The /post1 XML transfer of result files used in previous releases is no longer used so any existing solution Command objects which were modifying the Mechanical APDL application results to be brought back into the Mechanical application no longer function.

  • For loads imported from External Model, the Options dialog preference, Solver File Verbosity, enables you to control how much information is written to the input file (ds.dat) and output file (solve.out) during the solution process. The default does not write comments to the input and solver file. This option provides faster processing time from the Mechanical APDL solver. There are two additional options that enable you to increment the amount of information or to write all information to the file.