Keywords

Interface Elements, MSC.Nastran, Finite Element Method

Abstract

The objective of this research is to assess the performance of interface elements in the finite element method. Interface elements are implemented in the finite element codes such as MSC.NASTRAN, which is used in this study. Interface elements in MSC.NASTRAN provide a tool to transition between a shell-meshed region to another shell-meshed region as well as from a shell-meshed region to a solid-meshed region. Often, in practice shell elements are layered on shell elements or on solid elements without the use of interface elements. This is potentially inaccurate arising in mismatched degrees of freedom. In the case of a shell-to-shell interface, we consider the case in which the two regions have mismatched nodes along the boundary. Interface elements are used to connect these mismatched nodes. The interface elements are especially useful in global/local analysis, where a region with a dense mesh interfaces to a region with a less dense mesh. Interface elements are used to help avoid using special transition elements between two meshed regions. This is desirable since the transition elements can be severely distorted and cause poor results. Accurate results are obtained in shell-shell and shell-solid combinations. The most interesting result is that not using interface elements can lead to severe inaccuracies. This difficulty is illustrated by computing the stress concentration of a sharp elliptical hole.

Notes

If this is your thesis or dissertation, and want to learn how to access it or for more information about readership statistics, contact us at STARS@ucf.edu

Graduation Date

2004

Semester

Fall

Advisor

Nicholson, David

Degree

Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering (M.S.M.E.)

College

College of Engineering and Computer Science

Department

Mechanical, Materials, and Aerospace Engineering

Degree Program

Mechanical Engineering

Format

application/pdf

Identifier

CFE0000291

URL

http://purl.fcla.edu/fcla/etd/CFE0000291

Language

English

Release Date

January 2014

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Open Access)

Download

Share

COinS