[CIG-SHORT] RuntimeError: Invalid fault mesh: Too many vertices of an element on the fault

[Charles Williams]

Hi Hongfeng,

In the past, this sort of error has occurred when there is a lot of curvature in the fault in combination with poor mesh quality.  I'm assuming you're using a tetrahedral mesh.  In that case, having too many vertices on the fault indicates that all 4 vertices for a cell lie on the fault.  In your case, this is probably indicative of a poor quality mesh.  For example, a very flat cell could have all 4 vertices on the fault.  When that happens, it's no longer clear how to split the cell faces to form a cohesive cell.  You will need to improve the mesh quality to remove any cells with this sort of problem.

Cheers,
Charles


On 30/07/2012, at 1:03 PM, Hongfeng Yang wrote:

> Hi all,
> 
> I am running dynamic rupture simulations on a fault mesh with realistic 
> geometry. The simulation was done on a mesh with certain discretization 
> size (say d1). However, when I decreased the discretization size of the 
> mesh (say d2), PyLith stopped after reading the mesh due to an error, 
> Invalid fault mesh: Too many vertices of an element on the fault
> 
> I check the mesh quality with grid size of d2 and find there are a lot 
> of poor quality elements. But I do not understand how there could be too 
> many vertices of one element on the fault surface? What does this error 
> message mean, and what is causing the problem?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Hongfeng
> 
> -- 
> Postdoc Investigator
> Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
> Dept. Geology and Geophysics
> 360 Woods Hole Rd, MS 24
> Woods Hole, MA 02543
> 
> _______________________________________________
> CIG-SHORT mailing list
> CIG-SHORT at geodynamics.org
> http://geodynamics.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/cig-short

Charles A. Williams
Scientist
GNS Science
1 Fairway Drive, Avalon
PO Box 30368
Lower Hutt  5040
New Zealand
ph (office): 0064-4570-4566
fax (office): 0064-4570-4600
C.Williams at gns.cri.nz

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://geodynamics.org/pipermail/cig-short/attachments/20120730/bb9e958a/attachment.htm