A posteriori error estimator for hierarchical models for elastic bodies with thin domain

Abstract

A concept of hierarchical modeling, the newest modeling technology, has been introduced in early 1990's. This new technology has a great potential to advance the capabilities of current computational mechanics. A first step to implement this concept is to construct hierarchical models, a family of mathematical models sequentially connected by a key parameter of the problem under consideration and have different levels in modeling accuracy, and to investigate characteristics in their numerical simulation aspects. Among representative model problems to explore this concept are elastic structures such as beam-, arch-, plate- and shell-like structures because the mechanical behavior through the thickness can be approximated with sequential accuracy by varying the order of thickness polynomials in the displacement or stress fields. But, in the numerical, analysis of hierarchical models, two kinds of errors prevail, the modeling error and the numerical approximation error. To ensure numerical simulation quality, an accurate estimation of these two errors is definitely essential. Here, a local a posteriori error estimator for elastic structures with thin domain such as plate- and shell-like structures is derived using the element residuals and the flux balancing technique. This method guarantees upper bounds for the global error, and also provides accurate local error indicators for two types of errors, in the energy norm. Compared to the classical error estimators using the flux averaging technique, this shows considerably reliable and accurate effectivity indices. To illustrate the theoretical results and to verify the validity of the proposed error estimator, representative numerical examples are provided.