Fast Construction of the Implicit Surface for Complex Casting Geometries

Computational simulation relies on valid and accurate representations of the geometry of objects being simulated. However, the Stereo Lithography (STL), one of the most commonly used formats for computational simulation, may be invalid with several kinds of defects when the geometry is too geometrically and topologically complex. In many cases, castings have the most complicated geometries in the world, and its geometries in STL format always contain some defects. The implicit surface is a much more robust geometry representation than STL. With the representation in the implicit surface, most of the defects in STL can be cleared and ignored. This paper presents a method to fast construct the implicit surface for arbitrary complex casting geometries in the format of STL.