Equivalent static displacements method for contact force optimization

Abstract

Contact force optimization problems exist extensively in engineering. However, there are few simple and universal methods to solve contact force optimization due to the high nonlinearity and discontinuity. This paper proposes an equivalent static displacements (ESD) method to solve the contact force optimization, which is a dual method of the existed equivalent static loads method. The ESD is defined as a set of enforced displacements, whose reaction forces in linear static analysis are equal to the contact forces in nonlinear analysis. Therefore, the contact force optimization problem can be solved by performing static optimization considering reaction forces response. Two engineering examples verify that the ESD method can effectively solve the contact force optimization problem.