41.3.1 A strategy for improving the mesh

If you have a complex assembly, you should select MeshVerify to verify the quality of the mesh before you submit the job for analysis. The mesh verify tool can do the following:

Highlight elements of a selected shape that do not meet specified criteria, such as aspect ratio.
Print mesh statistics, such as the total number of elements of the chosen shape, the number of highlighted elements, and the average and worst values of the selection criterion.
Highlight elements that do not pass the mesh quality tests that are included with the input file processor in ABAQUS/Standard and ABAQUS/Explicit.

If the mesh verify tool indicates that you should try to improve the quality of the mesh, you should first try the following before turning to the Edit Mesh toolset:

Change the seed distribution
Add or modify partitions
Change the mesh technique

In addition, you might try modifying the parts in the Part module, or you might try using the Virtual Topology toolset and regenerating the mesh. You should treat the Edit Mesh toolset as the final step in the meshing process and use it only to make minor adjustments to nodes and elements. ABAQUS/CAE tries to preserve attributes, such as loads and boundary conditions, if you make changes to the mesh. If you modify a part, ABAQUS/CAE deletes the mesh when you return to the Mesh module; as a result, you will lose any edits that you made to the mesh.