Smoothed Finite Element Method Models Research Articles

An SFEM Abaqus UEL for Nonlinear Analysis of Solids

In this paper, three different smoothed finite element method (SFEM), viz., node-based smoothed finite element method (NS-FEM), face-based smoothed finite element method (FS-FEM) and [Formula: see text]-finite element method ([Formula: see text]-FEM) are adopted for 3D solids undergoing large deformation. The common feature of all these techniques is the introduction of smoothed strain which is written as a weighted average of the compatible strain field over smoothing domains. The choice of smoothing domain is what differentiates them. The spatial discretization can be based on the simplest and automatically genera-table four-node tetrahedral elements and aforementioned techniques have shown to yield accurate results even on a coarser discretization. To take the advantages of the SFEM, it is beneficial to the FEM community to have it implemented in the widely used Abaqus[Formula: see text] software. Such an implementation is challenging because the neighboring SFEM elements are interconnected in the smoothed strain matrices in the elemental level. In this work, the above-mentioned SFEM models are implemented in the commercial software Abaqus using the softwares’ user element (UEL) feature. The challenges during the definition and the assembly of the smoothing domains are effectively addressed in this work. The developed UEL and the associated files can be downloaded from https://github.com/nsundar/3DSFEM. The implementation is validated against benchmark examples and the robustness is demonstrated with complicated real-life problems, viz., tire patch contact with road and simulation of human thumb.

Bone remodeling analysis for a swine skull at continuous scale based on the smoothed finite element method

In order to study bone response during chewing, bone remodeling analysis at a continuous scale is performed to a swine skull obtained using μCT. The smoothed finite element method (S-FEM) is utilized to replace the finite element method (FEM) in bone remodeling as it is solving the “overly-stiff” problem in FEM by introducing strain smoothing technology to soften the stiffness matrix. Three S-FEM models with different levels of softening effects are developed, including node-based, edge-based, and face-based, which leads to various bone remodeling results for a better understanding of the remodeling process. During the remodeling process, the strain energy density is used as the mechanical stimulus, and the surface elements or smoothing domains are regarded as cortical bone. Under the action of mechanical stimuli, cortical bone and cancellous bone have been remodeled. In remodeling progress, ES-FEM shows close results as compared with the experimental μCT in nodal bone density distribution, FEM and FS-FEM are close to the μCT experimental model in average nodal density. In summary, the combined use of several methods provides more angles for the description of bone remodeling.

A high-fidelity 3D S-FEM stress analysis of a highly heterogeneous swine skull.

Fracture healing and growth of the bones are highly related to the stress level. Numerical analysis of stresses is the most effective means to determine the stress level, but it usually requires sufficient resolution to ensure an accurate description of geometry features of bones. In this paper, high-fidelity smoothed finite element method (S-FEM) skull models are created using computed tomography (CT) and micro-computed tomography (μCT) images of a juvenile pig skull. The material properties of the heterogeneous bone are modeled by a varying distribution of Young's modulus mapped to each element and smoothing domain to accurately capture the high heterogeneity. Different types of S-FEM models, including node-based, edge-based, and face-based, are developed for this high-fidelity modeling work. It is found that S-FEM has higher accuracy, in terms of displacements, stresses, and strain energy, compared to the traditional finite element method (FEM). Graphical abstract.

Development of SFEM-Pre: A Novel Preprocessor for Model Creation for the Smoothed Finite Element Method

Smoothed finite element method (S-FEM) is a new general numerical method which has been applied to solve various practical engineering problems. It combines standard finite element method (FEM) and meshfree techniques based on the weaken-weak (W2) formulation. This project, for the first time, develops a preprocessor software package SFEM-Pre for creating types of two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) S-FEM models following strictly the S-FEM theory. Because the software architecture of our 3D processor is the same as our 2D preprocessor, we will mainly introduce the 2D preprocessor in terms of software design for easier description, but the examples will include both 2D and 3D cases to fully demonstrate and validate the whole preprocessor of S-FEM. Our 2D preprocessor package is equipped with a graphical user interface (GUI) for easy use, and with a connectivity database for efficient computation. Schemes are developed for not only automatically meshes the problem domains using our GUI, but also accepts various geometry files made available from some existing commercial software packages, such as ABAQUS®and HyperMesh®. In order to improve the efficiency of our preprocessor, a parallel triangulation mesh generator has also been developed based on the advancing front technique (AFT) to create triangular meshes for complex geometry, and at the same time to create six types of connectivity needed for various S-FEM models. In addition, a database is implemented in our code to record all these connectivity to avoid duplicated calculation. Finally, intensive numerical experiments are conducted to validate the efficiency, accuracy and stability of our preprocessor codes. It is shown that with our preprocessor, an S-FEM can be created automatically without much human intervention for geometry of arbitrary complexity.

A Novel Alpha Smoothed Finite Element Method for Ultra-Accurate Solution Using Quadrilateral Elements

Smoothed finite element method (S-FEM) based on triangular elements has recently been widely used for solving solid mechanics problems. In this paper, a novel [Formula: see text]S-FEM using quadrilateral elements ([Formula: see text]SFEM-Q4) is proposed to obtain ultra-accurate solutions in the displacement and strain energy for solid mechanics problems. This method combines node-based S-FEM (NS-FEM), edge-based S-FEM (ES-FEM) and cell-based S-FEM (CS-FEM) equipped with a scale factor [Formula: see text] that controls contribution from each of these three different S-FEM models. This novel combination makes the best use of the upper bound property of the NS-FEM and the lower bound property of the CS-FEM (with 4 or more sub-smoothing domains for each element), and establishes a continuous strain-energy function of a scale factor [Formula: see text] for obtaining close-to-exact solutions. Our [Formula: see text]SFEM-Q4 also ensures the variational consistence and the compatibility of the displacement field, and hence guarantees to reproduce linear field exactly. Various solid mechanics problems are presented to validate the stability, effectiveness and ultra-accuracy of the proposed method.

An ABAQUS Implementation of the Cell-Based Smoothed Finite Element Method (CS-FEM)

The smoothed finite element method (S-FEM) has been developed recent years and is increasingly used for stress analysis for engineering design of structures, due to its high computational accuracy and outstanding robustness in against mesh distortion. However, there is currently no commercial S-FEM software package available for convenient engineering applications. This paper aims to integrate S-FEM into the [Formula: see text] software, because it is most widely used in engineering analyses and well integrated in computer aided engineering (CAE). From a family of S-FEM models, the cell-based finite element method (CS-FEM) is chosen to be implemented in ABAQUS, because a smoothing cell in the CS-FEM involves only one element, and hence the implementation can be achieved via the use of the user-defined element library (UEL). Since only nodal displacement results can be extracted when UEL subroutine is used in ABAQUS, a post-processing program is also developed to compute nodal strains/stresses and strain energy results that are useful in structure analysis and CAE. Our CS-FEM UEL is validated using four numerical examples under plane stress conditions. Compared with standard ABAQUS, the CS-FEM in ABAQUS improves the solution accuracy remarkably, and we have also confirmed the robustness of CS-FEM against heavily distorted meshes.

A smoothed finite element method for octree-based polyhedral meshes with large number of hanging nodes and irregular elements

Techniques are now available to generate high-quality polyhedral elements offering a good alternative way for accurate stress analysis for solids. However, distorted polyhedral elements cannot be effectively used in standard finite element methods (FEM) without extra complicated treatments, due to the hanging nodes on the element edges and complex shape of polyhedral elements. On the contrary, the hanging nodes and complex shape of the elements can be naturally dealt with in the smoothed finite element method (S-FEM). This paper, utilizes the octree method to automatically and efficiently generate unstructured polyhedral meshes, using the standard tessellation language (STL). We develop three S-FEM models for octree meshes, using all existing node-based, edge-based and face-based smoothing domains. A subdomain smoothing technique is developed to re-cut the smoothing domain (SD), which simplifies the process of smoothing domain formation. The shapes of the subdomains have some common geometries that are much easier to handle, making use of the good features offered by the S-FEM formulation. The introduction of subdomains does not affect the results of the calculations, and the properties of the three S-FEMs are still preserved. Several demonstration examples are presented to verify the efficiency of the present S-FEM models.

The smoothed finite element method (S-FEM): A framework for the design of numerical models for desired solutions

The smoothed finite element method (S-FEM) was originated by G R Liu by combining some meshfree techniques with the well-established standard finite element method (FEM). It has a family of models carefully designed with innovative types of smoothing domains. These models are found having a number of important and theoretically profound properties. This article first provides a concise and easy-to-follow presentation of key formulations used in the S-FEM. A number of important properties and unique features of S-FEM models are discussed in detail, including 1) theoretically proven softening effects; 2) upper-bound solutions; 3) accurate solutions and higher convergence rates; 4) insensitivity to mesh distortion; 5) Jacobian-free; 6) volumetric-locking-free; and most importantly 7) working well with triangular and tetrahedral meshes that can be automatically generated. The S-FEM is thus ideal for automation in computations and adaptive analyses, and hence has profound impact on AI-assisted modeling and simulation. Most importantly, one can now purposely design an S-FEM model to obtain solutions with special properties as wish, meaning that S-FEM offers a framework for design numerical models with desired properties. This novel concept of numerical model on-demand may drastically change the landscape of modeling and simulation. Future directions of research are also provided.

Application of smoothed finite element method in coupled hydro-mechanical analyses

Smoothed finite element method (SFEM) was introduced by application of the stabilized conforming nodal integration in the conventional finite element method. In this method, integration is performed on “smoothing domains” rather than elements. Smoothing domains are created based on cells, nodes or edges for two dimensional problems. Based on the smoothing domain creation method, different types of SFEM are developed that have different properties. It has been shown that these methods are insensitive to mesh distortion and are generally more computationally efficient than mesh-free and finite element methods for the same accuracy level. Because of their interesting features, they have been used to solve different problems. This paper investigates the performance of these methods in coupled hydro-mechanical (consolidation) analysis, by solution of some problems using a developed SFEM/FEM code. Biot’s consolidation theory is reviewed, and after introduction of the idea and formulation of SFEMs, discretized form of equations is given. Requirements for creation of stable coupled hydro-mechanical models are discussed and based on them, two methods for creation of stable SFEM models are introduced. To investigate the effectiveness of the methods, a number of examples are solved and results are compared with the finite element and analytical ones.

Automatic mesh generation for 3D smoothed finite element method (S-FEM) based on the weaken-weak formulation

The creation of smoothing domains based on a mesh of problem domain is one of the key tasks in the smoothed finite element method (S-FEM), especially for three dimensional (3D) problems. Traditionally, the smoothed strains in the 3D S-FEM implementations are calculated by using a volume-weighted average of the “raw” strains (strains in finite element method (FEM)) on the neighboring elements. In order to use the standard formulation based on the weaken-weak (W2) formulation, we need to know not only the smoothing domains, but also the area and the outer normal vector of each surface as well as volume of smoothing domains. This paper is the first time to present a comprehensive procedure and efficient algorithms for creating smoothing domains systematically with all the necessary information required for the surface-integral needed in the smoothed strain calculations. Several algorithms are given, including two for establishing connectivity lists among nodes, edges, faces and elements and three for the generation of smoothing domains for various S-FEM models. Besides, we introduce a simple but efficient approach to determine the outer normal vector of segmental surfaces for each smoothing domain. Three examples are presented to show the effectiveness of the given algorithms.

A MODIFIED TRIANGULATION ALGORITHM TAILORED FOR THE SMOOTHED FINITE ELEMENT METHOD (S-FEM)

Meshing is one of the key tasks in using the finite element method (FEM), the smoothed finite element method (S-FEM), finite volume method (FVM), and many other discrete numerical methods. Linear triangular (T3) mesh is one of the most widely used mesh, because it can be generated and refined automatically for discrete domains of complicated geometry, and hence save significantly the time for model creation. This paper presents a modified triangulation algorithm based on the advancing front technique to provide a comprehensive linear triangular mesh generator with six connectivity lists, including element–node (Ele–N) connectivity, element–edge (Ele–Eg) connectivity, edge–node (Eg–N) connectivity, edge–element (Eg–Ele) connectivity, node–edge (N–Eg) connectivity and node–element (N–Ele) connectivity. These six connectivity lists are generated along the way when the T3 elements are created, and hence it is done in a most efficient fashion. The connectivity is recorded in the usual counter-clockwise convention for convenient utilization in various S-FEM models for effective analyses. In addition, an algorithm is developed for renumbering the nodes in the T3 mesh to obtain a minimized bandwidth of stiffness matrices for both FEM and S-FEM models.

A SMOOTHED FEM (S-FEM) FOR HEAT TRANSFER PROBLEMS

By smoothing, via various ways, the compatible strain fields of the standard finite element method (FEM) using the gradient smoothing technique, a family of smoothed FEMs (S-FEMs) has been developed recently. The S-FEM possesses the advantages of both mesh-free methods and the standard FEM and works well with triangular and tetrahedral background cells and elements. Intensive theoretical investigations have shown that the S-FEM models can achieve numerical solutions for many important properties, such as the upper bound solution in strain energy, free from volumetric locking, insensitive to the distortion of the background cells, super-accuracy and super-convergence in displacement or stress solutions or both. Engineering problems, including complex heat transfer problems, have also been analyzed with better accuracy and efficiency. This paper presents the general formulation of the S-FEM for thermal problems in one, two and three dimensions. To examine our formulation, some computational results are compared with those obtained using other established means.