Optimal local truncation error method for solution of 2-D elastodynamics problems with irregular interfaces and unfitted Cartesian meshes as well as for post-processing

Abstract

The optimal local truncation error method (OLTEM) with unfitted Cartesian meshes recently developed for the scalar wave and heat equations for heterogeneous materials is extended to a more complex case of a system of the elastodynamics PDEs. Compact 9-point stencils (similar to those for linear finite elements) are used for OLTEM. Compared to our previous results, a new approach is used for the calculation of the right-hand side of the stencil equations due to body forces. It significantly simplifies the analytical derivations of OLTEM for time-dependent problems. There are no unknowns on interfaces between different materials; the structure of the global semi-discrete equations for OLTEM is the same for homogeneous and heterogeneous materials. For the first time we have also developed OLTEM with the diagonal mass matrix. In contrast to many known approaches with some ad-hoc calculations of the diagonal mass matrix, OLTEM offers a rigorous approach which is a particular case of OLTEM with the non-diagonal mass matrix. Another novelty of the article is a new post-processing procedure for the accurate calculations of stresses. It includes the same compact 9-point stencils as those in basic computations and uses the accelerations and the displacements at the grid points along with the PDEs for the stress calculations. OLTEM yields accurate numerical results for heterogeneous materials with big contrasts in the material properties of different components. Numerical experiments for elastic heterogeneous materials show: a) at the same number of degrees of freedom (dof), OLTEM with unfitted Cartesian meshes is more accurate than linear finite elements with similar stencils and conformed meshes; at the engineering accuracy of 0.1 % for the displacements, OLTEM reduces the number of dof by more than 20 times; at the engineering accuracy of 0.1 % for the stresses, OLTEM with the new post-processing procedure reduces the number of dof by more than 104 times compared to linear finite elements; b) at the same number of dof, OLTEM with unfitted Cartesian meshes is even more computationally efficient than high-order finite elements with much wider stencils and conformed meshes. This will lead to a huge reduction in the computation time for elastodynamics problems solved by OLTEM and will allow the direct computations of some complex wave propagation and structural dynamics problems for heterogeneous materials without the scale separation.