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Meshing error for very thin geometries: "Intersecting Face Elements"

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Hi, I'm working with two geometries that are very thin as part of a larger set of geometric entities within my simulation (I won't bore you with the other details of my geometries, as my problem is with the two very thin geometries).

I get the following error while meshing:
"Failed to generate mesh for domain.
-Domain 1
Intersecting face elements.
- Face: *a large list of faces I won't bother to repeat here* "

The first of two geometries in question represents a set of thin gold electrodes of thickness 2.54 microns, that sit below the second geometry in question, a thin layer of PDMS of thickness 5 microns. The width and length of these geometries are many times larger than the thickness, at several dozen mm approximately.

I created the electrodes on a work plane on the xy plane, located on z-coordinate: 0 mm, and then extruded down (with the "Reverse direction" box checked) 0.00254mm. I then made the PDMS layer on a second work plane, also on the xy plane and located on z-coordinate: 0 mm, and extruded up 0.005mm.

I originally had an error about the geometries having an element much smaller than the minimum element size, which I corrected by changing the minimum element size of my mesh to the smallest dimension I have in my geometries, 2.54 microns. But now I'm getting the error above, and I'm not sure where to go from here.

I'm not sure as to whether the source of the error is (still) the very small dimensions, or it's a simpler error involving the creation of the geometries themselves; could it be the fact that my two work planes occupy the same z-coordinate? Do I need to use some command to tell COMSOL that the two respective extrudes are simply in contact, and not occupying the same space at z-coordinate = 0?

I've tried looking up the problem online, had little luck on finding solutions to this error. I've tried partitioning the entire geometry down the middle, as I saw suggested on a post that seemed somewhat similar to my problems (www.comsol.kr/community/forums/general/thread/15010/), but there was no change. It might not be useful for my type of error, but I figured it was worth a try.

I know this was a long post, but any help would be appreciated!

0 Replies Last Post 19 mai 2016, 09:24 UTC−4
COMSOL Moderator

Hello Christopher Foskett

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