Sphere-Function-Based Shape Modelling of Open Cell Metal Foam with Plateau Borders

Abstract

To construct an open cell metal foam model, a simple method using spheres has been proposed. In this method, spheres are arranged so that the edges are constructed as Plateau borders, and an implicit surface f (x) = 0 combined by constructive solid geometry is generated from these spheres. The open cell metal foam model generated by the proposed method has edges and junctions, and the cross-sections of Plateau borders in the model are concave triangles. In the proposed method, the open cell model that has a periodic structure can be generated by adjusting the arrangement of spheres. In addition, by employing the pnorm-based implicit surfaces, the proposed method has been extended so that various kinds of open cell model can be constructed. Although the open cell models generated by the proposed method are midair models, they can be converted to solid models constructed as voxel meshes. Furthermore, an arbitrary shape defined by an implicit surface g(x) = 0 can be represented as a collection of extracted cells in the voxel mesh of open cell model.