Intersection with MSC Apex Generative Design

Goal of this tutorial

Working with/without intersection

Intersections between optimisation results and the Design Spaces are needed to create the final, manufacturable design. This ensures all functional sharp edges are available and the generative designed part is inside the boundary limits. An intersection is done automatically in MSC Apex Generative Design 2020 FP1. In some cases it makes sense to let the optimisation run through with a slightly different Design Space and do the intersection afterwards manually. Follow these steps for the manual intersection:

Workflow for an intersection with MSC Apex Generative Design:

Use the Advanced User Settings to carry out the optimisation without an automatic intersection.
The final optimisation result needs to be exported as an STL-file directly from the Post Processing. We recommend exporting binary STL-files.
The exported STL can be imported back into the same MSC Apex Generative Design project. The correct unit system of the STL-file has to be selected. In this case the optimisation was done in SI units so Meters is the correct unit system. The Split on Feature/Vertex Angle should be deactivated for further operations with the geometry.
With the Geometry Edit Tools a Boolean intersection with the Design Space and the imported optimisation result can be done. Now all functional surfaces and sharp edges are created.