6.0 Nodes and Elements ====================== 6.1 Selecting Elements ---------------------- The **MINEDW** software provides tools for selecting nodes and elements to perform the following tasks: 1. Assign and edit properties that are defined on elements, such as hydraulic conductivity and storage zones, recharge zones, and evaporation zones; 2. Assign and edit the boundary conditions related to nodes, such as constant heads, pumping wells, and variable-flux boundary conditions; 3. Move nodes within the finite-element mesh; 4. Add pinch-outs for increased vertical model discretization; and 5. Refine and extend the mesh. The tool buttons that are used to select nodes and elements are listed in Table 6.1, below. Table 6.1 The Nodes and Elements Tool Buttons .. raw:: html
figure_3_1f_manual Select Elements or Nodes
figure_3_1l_manual Select with Polygon
figure_3_1m_manual Select with Overlay
figure_3_1g_manual Move Nodes
figure_3_1h_manual Search Node/Element
figure_3_1e_manual View Mode
When modifying the element- or node-related properties, it is important that the plot item being modified (node or element) is the first active plot item in the “\ *Plot Items*\ ” pane. When selecting elements and assigning new hydrogeologic zones, for example, the “\ *Element*\ ” plot item should be the first active plot item in the “\ *Plot Items*\ ” pane. Conversely, when selecting nodes and assigning a ground-surface elevation, the “\ *Node*\ ” plot item should be the first active plot item in the “\ *Plot Items*\ ” pane. To select elements, use the “\ *Select*\ ” tool when element-related plots are displayed in the View Pane. Element-related plots include “\ *2-D Plane”* and “\ *3D Element”* plots, which can be found in the “\ *Control Panel*\ ” under the “\ *List*\ ” menu. In the “\ *Control Panel*\ ” Pane, under either the 2-D or 3-D plot attributes, the user can specify the elemental data (e.g., hydraulic zones using the “\ *3D Element*\ ” plot item or evaporation and recharge using *“2-D Plane”* plot items) to view, select, and edit. 6.1.1 Selecting Elements in 2-D ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If an element-related plot is displayed, then the elements can be selected using the following approaches: - Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click individual elements in the View Pane. To deselect individual elements, right-click on the selected element. To deselect all selected elements, press the [Esc] key. - Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click and drag the cursor to select the elements in a rectangle. Right-clicking and dragging a selection box around selected elements will deselect the elements. - Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click the “\ *Select with Polygon*\ ” tool, shown in Table 6.1. Use the “\ *Select with Polygon*\ ” tool to select multiple elements in a desired area in the model domain. To close the polygon, press the [Enter] key. - Add a point, polyline, or polygon file to the View Pane using the *“BLN,” “ESRI Shape File*,” or “\ *Point Data*\ ” plot items. The file that will be used as an overlay must be added to the View Pane (see Section 3.4.1.8) before the “\ *Select with Overlay*\ ” tool is clicked. If multiple overlays are added to the View Pane, only the topmost listed in the *“Plot Items”* pane will be used to select. To use the overlay below the topmost overlay, the latter should be deactivated. Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click the “\ *Select with Overlay*\ ” tool. When the “\ *Select with Overlay*\ ” tool is activated, the dialog box shown in Figure 6.1 appears. To deselect a selected element, right-click on that element or right-click and drag a rectangle around multiple selected elements. Press the [ESC] key to deselect all selected elements. .. figure:: media/figure_6_1_manual.png :width: 2.29167in :height: 1.47902in :align: center Figure 6.1 The “\ *Choose Method of Selection*\ ” dialog box To exit the select mode, click the “\ *View Mode*\ ” tool. To deselect all elements before editing, press the [ESC] key. As previously described, there are three options when selecting elements with an overlay file. If the “\ *Point*\ ” option is selected, then the closest elements for each point are selected. If the “\ *Polyline*\ ” option is selected, then elements along the polyline are selected. If the “\ *Polygon*\ ” option is selected, then the elements inside the polygon are selected. After the elements are selected, press the [Enter] key, and one of the dialog boxes shown in Figures 6.2, 6.3, and 6.4 appears. These dialog boxes can be used to edit the recharge zone (Figure 6.2), evaporation zone (Figure 6.3), or geological zone (Figure 6.4) input data. .. figure:: media/figure_6_2_manual.png :width: 2.66667in :height: 1.07292in :align: center Figure 6.2 The “\ *Select Recharge Zone*\ ” dialog box To edit the spatial distribution of recharge zones, select elements using a “\ *2-D Plane*\ ” plot item and change the “\ *Color By*\ ” attribute to “\ *Recharge*.” When the “\ *Select Recharge Zone*\ ” dialog box appears, the recharge zone for the selected elements can be assigned using the drop-down box next to “\ *Zone*.” .. figure:: media/figure_6_3_manual.png :width: 2.67708in :height: 1.07292in :align: center Figure 6.3 The “\ *Select Evaporation Zone*\ ” dialog box Evaporation zones can be assigned and modified in a manner similar to recharge zones. Change the “\ *Color By*\ ” attribute on the “\ *2-D Plane*\ ” plot item to “\ *Evaporation*,” select the desired region as previously described, and then press the [Enter] key; the “\ *Select Evaporation Zone*\ ” dialog box then appears. Using the drop-down box in the “\ *Select Evaporation Zone*\ ” dialog box, select the desired evaporation zone to assign the zone to the selected elements. More information on assigning recharge and evaporation is provided in Section 7.4. Use a “\ *2D Element*\ ” or “\ *3D Element*\ ” plot item to assign geologic properties to elements. When the desired elements are selected, press the [Enter] key, and then the “\ *Select Geological Zone*\ ” dialog box shown in Figure 6.4 appears. .. figure:: media/figure_6_4_manual.png :width: 4.72983in :height: 1.98986in :align: center Figure 6.4 The “\ *Select Geological Zone*\ ” dialog box Element properties in multiple layers can be changed by entering the layer to extend the selected elements to, as shown in Figure 6.5. The layer selected in the attribute panel of the “\ *Element*\ ” plot item determines the uppermost layer that the change affects. .. figure:: media/figure_6_5_manual.png :width: 4.62565in :height: 0.28129in :align: center Figure 6.5 The “\ *Select Geological Zone*\ ” dialog box showing the multiple layers option Selected element numbers can be exported by using the “\ *Export*\ ” function shown in Figure 6.4 and specifying an output file. If elements are exported, then the output file will contain the selected element numbers. 6.1.2 Selecting Elements in 3-D ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Another option to select elements and assign the zone properties to the elements is to use a .DXF file. To assign a geologic unit to an element using a 3-D .DXF file, add a “\ *DXF”* plot item to the View Pane by selecting “\ *List*\ ” and then “\ *File Data.*\ ” Under “\ *File Data*,” double-click “\ *DXF*.” The “\ *Attributes*\ ” tab then appears. Click on the “\ **+**\ ” next to “\ *File*\ ” and the *“Select DXF Data File”* dialog box opens. Select the desired 3-D .DXF file and click “\ *Open*.” If multiple geologic units are represented in the .DXF file, the assignment of each geologic unit to the model elements should be done individually. Click the “\ *Layers*\ ” button under the “\ *Attributes*\ ” tab shown in Figure 6.6 and disable the other units if there are multiple. .. figure:: media/figure_6_6_manual.png :width: 3.51091in :height: 2.59411in :align: center Figure 6.6 The “\ *Attributes*\ ” dialog box Click the symbol next to “\ *To Zone*,” as shown in Figure 6.6. The “\ *DXF to Zone*\ ” dialog box appears. Select the desired zone to assign to the elements in the drop-down box. For geologic units (i.e., objects that have a volume), select “\ *Volume*\ ”; for structures (e.g., faults), select “\ *Face*,” as shown in Figure 6.7. For element selection, if the “\ *Whole*\ ” option is selected, only the elements that are completely inside of the .DXF file are selected. If the “\ *Center*\ ” option is selected, the elements are selected if the element centers are inside the .DXF file. Click “\ *OK*\ ” to complete the assignment. .. figure:: media/figure_6_7_manual.png :width: 3.20878in :height: 1.81275in :align: center Figure 6.7 The “\ *DXF to Zone*\ ” dialog box To exit the *“Select”* mode, click the “\ *View Mode*\ ” button. To deselect all elements before editing, press the [ESC] key. 6.2 Selecting Nodes ------------------- The “\ *Select*\ ” tool can also be used when node-related plots are displayed in the View Pane. Node-related plots include 2-D and 3-D contour plots, which can be found in the “\ *Control Panel*\ ” on the “\ *List*\ ” tab under the *“Node”* plot items group. The operations that can be performed are described in the sections that follow. To select the node, the node plot item should be the first active plot item in the “\ *Plot Item*\ ” pane. Nodes can be selected using the following methods: - Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click on the nodes in the View Pane. To deselect individual nodes, right-click on the selected node. - Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click and drag the cursor to select nodes in a rectangle. Deselect with a right click. - Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click the “\ *Select with Polygon*\ ” tool. Use the “\ *Select with Polygon*\ ” tool to select multiple nodes in a desired area in the model domain. To close the polygon, press the [Enter] key. - Add a point, polyline, or polygon file to the View Pane using the *“BLN,” “ESRI Shape File*,” or “\ *Point Data*\ ” plot items. Click the “\ *Select*\ ” tool and then click the “\ *Select with Overlay*\ ” tool. When the “\ *Select with Overlay*\ ” tool is activated, the *“Choose Method of Selection:”* dialog box appears (Figure 6.1). The file that will be used as an overlay must be added to the View Pane before the “\ *Select with Overlay*\ ” tool is clicked. If multiple overlays are added to the View Pane, only the topmost listed in the *“Plot Items”* pane will be used to select. To use the overlay below the topmost overlay, the latter should be deactivated. To deselect a selected node, right-click on that node or right-click and drag a rectangle around multiple selected nodes. Press the [ESC] key to deselect all selected nodes. After the nodes are selected, press the [Enter] key to open the “\ *Assign Properties for Nodes*\ ” dialog box shown in Figure 6.8. .. figure:: media/figure_6_8_manual.png :width: 6.00000in :height: 2.37708in :align: center Figure 6.8 The “\ *Assign Properties for Nodes*\ ” dialog box Several operations can be performed on the selected nodes. - Assign boundary conditions (constant head, variable flux, or pumping wells), as shown in Figure 6.9. After selecting one of the options, the number of layers to be assigned with the boundary conditions should also be specified, as discussed later in this section. .. figure:: media/figure_6_9_manual.png :width: 4.11516in :height: 1.07307in :align: center Figure 6.9 Assign boundary conditions to selected nodes - Change the elevation of the selected nodes, as shown in Figure 6.10. .. figure:: media/figure_6_10_manual.png :width: 2.81364in :height: 0.28136in :align: center Figure 6.10 Assign constant elevation to selected nodes - Interpolate the elevations of the selected nodes using a data file by clicking on the button next to “\ *Interpolated from File*,\ *”* as shown in Figure 6.11. The format of the data file is a series of x, y, z space delimited data. .. figure:: media/figure_6_11_manual.png :width: 3.89741in :height: 0.31263in :align: center Figure 6.11 Assign elevation by interpolating elevation data - After the selection of one of the boundary conditions as shown in Figure 6.9, specify the number of layers. If nodes in more than one layer are to be selected, then the number of layers to be modified can be selected (Figure 6.12). .. figure:: media/figure_6_12_manual.png :width: 2.70871in :height: 0.71885in :align: center Figure 6.12 The multiple layers specification dialog box - Export the data. The selected node numbers can be exported to a .DAT file by using the export button, as shown in Figure 6.13. If nodes are exported, then the output file will contain the selected node numbers and the corresponding node elevations. .. figure:: media/figure_6_13_manual.png :width: 2.56250in :height: 0.34375in :align: center Figure 6.13 The options available for both nodes and elements To exit out of the *“Select”* mode, click the “\ *View Mode*\ ” tool after closing the *“Assign Properties for Nodes”* dialog box. To deselect all the selected elements before editing, press the [ESC] key. .. |figure_3_1a_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1a_manual.png :width: 0.27094in :height: 0.33347in .. |figure_3_1b_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1b_manual.png :width: 0.27094in :height: 0.33347in .. |figure_3_1c_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1c_manual.png :width: 0.23968in :height: 0.33347in .. |figure_3_1d_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1d_manual.png :width: 0.28136in :height: 0.33347in .. |figure_3_1e_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1e_manual.png :width: 0.28136in :height: 0.33347in .. |figure_3_1f_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1f_manual.png :width: 0.23125in :height: 0.29600in .. |figure_3_1g_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1a_manual.png :width: 0.25312in :height: 0.30000in .. |figure_3_1h_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1h_manual.png :width: 0.24193in :height: 0.30000in .. |figure_3_1i_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1i_manual.png :width: 0.28136in :height: 0.32305in .. |figure_3_1j_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1j_manual.png :width: 0.28136in :height: 0.33347in .. |figure_3_1k_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1k_manual.png :width: 0.30000in :height: 0.27857in .. |figure_3_1l_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1l_manual.png :width: 0.30000in :height: 0.28000in .. |figure_3_1m_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1m_manual.png :width: 0.30000in :height: 0.30000in .. |figure_3_1n_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1n_manual.png :width: 0.23968in :height: 0.21884in .. |figure_3_1o_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1o_manual.png :width: 0.23968in :height: 0.21884in .. |figure_3_1p_manual| image:: media/figure_3_1p_manual.png :width: 0.23968in :height: 0.21884in