New spatial curved beam and cylindrical shell elements of gradient-deficient Absolute Nodal Coordinate Formulation

Abstract

Based on previous studies, a new spatial curved slender-beam finite element and a new cylindrical shell finite element are proposed in the frame of gradient-deficient Absolute Nodal Coordinate Formulation (ANCF). The strain energy of the beam element is derived by using the definition of the Green–Lagrange strain tensor in continuum mechanics so that the assumption on small strain can be relaxed. By using the differential geometry and the continuum mechanics, the angle between two base vectors of a defined local coordinate frame of the cylindrical shell element is introduced into the strain energy formulations. Therefore, the new shell element can be used to model parallelogram shells. The analytical formulations of elastic forces and their Jacobian for the above two finite elements of gradient-deficient ANCF are also derived via the skills of tensor analysis. The generalized-alpha method is used to solve the huge set of system equations. Finally, four case studies including both static and dynamic problems are given to validate the proposed beam and cylindrical shell elements of gradient-deficient ANCF.