Transient shell response by numerical time integration

In using the finite element method to compute a transient response, two choices must be made. First, some form of mass matrix must be decided upon. Either the consistent mass matrix prescribed by the finite element method can be employed or some form of diagonal mass matrix may be introduced. Secondly, some particular time integration procedure must be adopted. The procedures available divide themselves into two classes: the conditionally stable explicit schemes and the unconditionally or conditionally stable implicit schemes. The choices should be guided by both economy and accuracy. Using exact discrete solutions compared to the exact solutions of the differential equations, the results of these choices are displayed. Concrete examples of well-matched methods, as well as ill-matched methods, are identified and demonstrated. In particular, the diagonal mass matrix and the explicit central difference time integration method are shown to be a good combination in terms of accuracy and economy.     

An essentially non‐oscillatory semi‐Lagrangian method for tidal flow simulations

We develop an essentially non‐oscillatory semi‐Lagrangian method for solving two‐dimensional tidal flows. The governing equations are derived from the incompressible Navier–Stokes equations with assumptions of shallow water flows including bed frictions, eddy viscosity, wind shear stresses and Coriolis forces. The method employs the modified method of characteristics to discretize the convective term in a finite element framework. Limiters are incorporated in the method to reconstruct an essentially non‐oscillatory algorithm at minor additional cost. The central idea consists in combining linear and quadratic interpolation procedures using nodes of the finite element where departure points are localized. The resulting semi‐discretized system is then solved by an explicit Runge–Kutta Chebyshev scheme with extended stages. This scheme adds in a natural way a stabilizing stage to the conventional Runge–Kutta method using the Chebyshev polynomials. The proposed method is verified for the recirculation tidal flow in a channel with forward‐facing step. We also apply the method for simulation of tidal flows in the Strait of Gibraltar. In both test problems, the proposed method demonstrates its ability to handle the interaction between water free‐surface and bed frictions. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hybrid finite element/volume method for shallow water equations

A hybrid numerical scheme based on finite element and finite volume methods is developed to solve shallow water equations. In the recent past, we introduced a series of hybrid methods to solve incompressible low and high Reynolds number flows for single and two‐fluid flow problems. The present work extends the application of hybrid method to shallow water equations. In our hybrid shallow water flow solver, we write the governing equations in non‐conservation form and solve the non‐linear wave equation using finite element method with linear interpolation functions in space. On the other hand, the momentum equation is solved with highly accurate cell‐center finite volume method. Our hybrid numerical scheme is truly a segregated method with primitive variables stored and solved at both node and element centers. To enhance the stability of the hybrid method around discontinuities, we introduce a new shock capturing which will act only around sharp interfaces without sacrificing the accuracy elsewhere. Matrix‐free GMRES iterative solvers are used to solve both the wave and momentum equations in finite element and finite volume schemes. Several test problems are presented to demonstrate the robustness and applicability of the numerical method. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Application of finite element methods to thermohydrodynamic lubrication

A finite element formulation is presented for the equations governing the steady thermohydrodynamic behaviour of liquid lubricated bearings. This formulation permits application of the iterative solution scheme to bearings of arbitrary geometry. A generalized Reynolds equation resulting from the combination of the mass and momentum conservation equations is cast into variational form and used to derive general finite element equations. The method of weighted residuals with Galerkin's criterion is used to generate finite element matrix equations for the thermal energy equation. In addition to the finite element formulation, a discussion of appropriate finite difference techniques is also given for problems without complex geometry. As an example, the formulations are applied to obtain numerical solutions for a three-dimensional sector thrust bearing operating in the thermohydrodynamic regime. Pressure, velocity and temperature distributions are give, and the thermohydrodynamic solutions are compared with the results of classical isothermal theory.     

A finite element solution of a tidal current problem in the seto inland sea by using the ICCG method

When the finite element method is applied to the analysis of tidal currents in an inland sea with many islands, a system of linear equations with large band and sparse coefficient matrix is solved at each time step, and therefore the finite element methods usually suffer a severe economic disadvantage for practical calculations. The method used in this paper for solving a system of linear equations with large band and sparse coefficient matrix is the incomplete Cholesky conjugate gradient (ICCG) method: The ICCG method was compared with other methods such as the Gaussian elimination method, the Gauss–Seidel method and the conjugate gradient method. This method showed significant improvement in computation time and it can overcome the disadvantage that the efficiency to solve the matrix equations which appear in the finite element analysis of tidal currents usually diminishes as the bandwidth grows. The simulation results of tidal currents in the Seto Inland Sea of Japan were compared with field data and good agreements were obtained.     

Residual flow procedure for sea water intrusion in unconfined aquifers

A simplified procedure is presented for the analysis of sea water intrusion in unconfined aquifers. It involves the finite element method with a residual flow procedure which combines transformation of the salt water zone into the fresh water zone that has the same pressure distribution as that of the salt water. This procedure avoids simultaneous solutions of governing differential equations for both flow and mass transport. Numerical results are compared with laboratory observations.     

分析不同材料界面应力奇异性的一维杂交有限元方法

该文提出了一种计算效率较高的分析不同材料界面应力奇异性的一维杂交有限元方法。为了推导该方法,首先列出了用于求解不同材料界面裂纹奇异应力场特征解的基本方程和边界条件,然后利用加权残量方法(weighted residual method),得到上述基本方程和边界条件的弱形式,该弱形式的基本变量为位移和应力。运用Galerkin有限元方法的思想及上述弱形式,最后得到了一个一维杂交有限元方法,该一维杂交有限元方法只需对扇形区域在角度方向上离散,其总体方程为一个二次特征矩阵方程。数值算例表明:该方法可以准确而高效地计算不同材料界面奇异应力场的特征解。     

A NEW TWO-DIMENSIONAL FINITE ELEMENT MODEL FOR THE SHALLOW WATER EQUATIONS USING A LAGRANGIAN FRAMEWORK CONSTRUCTED ALONG FLUID PARTICLE TRAJECTORIES

In this paper we describe a new finite element model for the tidal hydrodynamics in estuaries. The mathematical model is based on the solution of the two-dimensional shallow water equations in a Lagrangian framework which is defined along the trajectories of fluid particles. This method gives a flexible and robust numerical scheme for moving boundary flows encountered in tidal water systems. In order to validate the developed model we have, at first instance, compared our numerical results with analytical solutions obtained for domains with simple geometries. Further tests are then conducted to demonstrate the model's ability to cope with conditions such as hydraulic shock, abrupt changes in the flow domain geometry and gradual changes of water surface breadth. The change in the water surface breadth corresponds to the drying and wetting of the plains along the banks of a typical tidal river/estuary reach. The drying and wetting of flood plains result in the existence of very shallow depth of water at some sections of the flow domain during a tidal cycle. The flow equations under these conditions are strongly convection dominated. Previously published tidal models rely on either, some form of upwinding or the use of extremely fine meshes to give stable results for the convection dominated very shallow depth computations in estuaries. We show that our model can yield stable and accurate results for very shallow depths in the tidal flow domains without using any kind of artifical damping or excessive mesh refinement. Computational costs of simulating hydrodynamical conditions in a natural water course, even using a depth averaged two-dimensional approach, can be very high. The ability of our scheme to cope with convection dominated conditions has enabled us to economize the computational efforts by using coarse meshes in our finite element calculations. After the validation stage, the developed model is applied to simulate the tidal conditions in a real estuary. The comparison of the model results with the field observations shows a close agreement between these sets of data     

A scaled boundary finite element formulation for dynamic elastoplastic analysis

This study presents the development of the scaled boundary finite element method (SBFEM) to simulate elastoplastic stress wave propagation problems subjected to transient dynamic loadings. Material nonlinearity is considered by first reformulating the SBFEM to obtain an explicit form of shape functions for polygons with an arbitrary number of sides. The material constitutive matrix and the residual stress fields are then determined as analytical polynomial functions in the scaled boundary coordinates through a local least squares fit to evaluate the elastoplastic stiffness matrix and the residual load vector semianalytically. The treatment of the inertial force within the solution of the nonlinear system of equations is also presented within the SBFEM framework. The nonlinear equation system is solved using the unconditionally stable Newmark time integration algorithm. The proposed formulation is validated using several benchmark numerical examples.     

Least squares finite element analysis of laminar boundary layer flows

Based on the least squares error criterion, a class of finite element is formulated for the numerical analysis of steady state viscous boundary layer flow problems. The method is essentially a discrete element-wise minimization of square and weighted residuals which arise from the attempts in approximately satisfying boundary layer equations. An iterative linearization scheme is developed to circumvent the mathematical difficulties posed by the non-linear boundary layer equations. It results in a process of successive least squares minimizations of residual errors arising from satisfying a set of linear differential equations. A mathematical justification for the method is presented. A major feature of the method lies in the linearization approach which renders non-linear differential equations amenable to linear least squares finite element analysis. Another important feature rests on the proposed finite element formulation which preserves the symmetric nature of finite element matrix equations through the use of the least squares error criterion. Numerical examples of viscous flow along a flat plate are presented to demonstrate the applicability of the method as well as to illuminate discussions on the theoretical aspects of the method.     

A general mass lumping scheme for the variants of the extended finite element method

A new strategy for the mass matrix lumping of enriched elements for explicit transient analysis is presented. It is shown that to satisfy the kinetic energy conservation, the use of zero or negative masses for enriched degrees of freedom of lumped mass matrix may be necessary. For a completely cracked element, by lumping the mass of each side of the interface into the finite element nodes located at the same side and assigning zero masses to the enriched degrees of freedom, the kinetic energy for rigid body translations is conserved without transferring spurious energy across the interface. The time integration is performed by adopting an explicit-implicit technique, where the regular and enriched degrees of freedom are treated explicitly and implicitly, respectively. The proposed method can be viewed as a general mass lumping scheme for the variants of the extended finite element methods because it can be used irrespective of the enrichment method. It also preserves the optimal critical time step of an intact finite element by treating the enriched degrees of freedom implicitly. The accuracy and efficiency of the proposed mass matrix are validated with several benchmark examples.     

An element‐wise,locally conservative Galerkin (LCG) method for solving diffusion and convection–diffusion problems

An element‐wise locally conservative Galerkin (LCG) method is employed to solve the conservation equations of diffusion and convection–diffusion. This approach allows the system of simultaneous equations to be solved over each element. Thus, the traditional assembly of elemental contributions into a global matrix system is avoided. This simplifies the calculation procedure over the standard global (continuous) Galerkin method, in addition to explicitly establishing element‐wise flux conservation. In the LCG method, elements are treated as sub‐domains with weakly imposed Neumann boundary conditions. The LCG method obtains a continuous and unique nodal solution from the surrounding element contributions via averaging. It is also shown in this paper that the proposed LCG method is identical to the standard global Galerkin (GG) method, at both steady and unsteady states, for an inside node. Thus, the method, has all the advantages of the standard GG method while explicitly conserving fluxes over each element. Several problems of diffusion and convection–diffusion are solved on both structured and unstructured grids to demonstrate the accuracy and robustness of the LCG method. Both linear and quadratic elements are used in the calculations. For convection‐dominated problems, Petrov–Galerkin weighting and high‐order characteristic‐based temporal schemes have been implemented into the LCG formulation. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Finite element multigrid solution of Euler flows past installed aero-engines

A finite element based procedure for the solution of the compressible Euler equations on unstructured tetrahedral grids is described. The spatial discretisation is accomplished by means of an approximate variational formulatin, with the explicit addition of a matrix form of artificial viscosity. The solution is advanced in time by means of an explicit multi-stage time stepping procedure. The method is implemented in terms of an edge based representation for the tetrahedral grid. The solution procedure is accelerated by use of a fully unstructured multigrid algorithm. The approach is applied to the simulation of the flow past an installed aero-engine nacelle, at three different free stream conditions. Comparison is made between the numerical predictions and experimental pressure observations.     

Finite calculus formulation for incompressible solids using linear triangles and tetrahedra

Many finite elements exhibit the so‐called ‘volumetric locking’ in the analysis of incompressible or quasi‐incompressible problems.In this paper, a new approach is taken to overcome this undesirable effect. The starting point is a new setting of the governing differential equations using a finite calculus (FIC) formulation. The basis of the FIC method is the satisfaction of the standard equations for balance of momentum (equilibrium of forces) and mass conservation in a domain of finite size and retaining higher order terms in the Taylor expansions used to express the different terms of the differential equations over the balance domain. The modified differential equations contain additional terms which introduce the necessary stability in the equations to overcome the volumetric locking problem. The FIC approach has been successfully used for deriving stabilized finite element and meshless methods for a wide range of advective–diffusive and fluid flow problems. The same ideas are applied in this paper to derive a stabilized formulation for static and dynamic finite element analysis of incompressible solids using linear triangles and tetrahedra. Examples of application of the new stabilized formulation to linear static problems as well as to the semi‐implicit and explicit 2D and 3D non‐linear transient dynamic analysis of an impact problem and a bulk forming process are presented. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Linear finite elements with orthogonal discontinuous basis functions for explicit earthquake ground motion modeling

The dynamic explicit finite element method is commonly used in earthquake ground motion modeling. In this method, the element mass matrix is approximately lumped, which may lead to numerical dispersion. On the other hand, the orthogonal finite element method, based on orthogonal polynomial basis functions, naturally derives a lumped diagonal mass matrix and can be applied to dynamic explicit finite element analysis. In this paper, we propose finite elements based on orthogonal discontinuous basis functions, the element mass matrices of which are lumped without approximation. Orthogonal discontinuous basis functions are used to improve the accuracy and reduce the numerical dispersion in earthquake ground motion modeling. We present a detailed formulation of the 4‐node tetrahedral and 8‐node hexahedral elements. The relationship between the proposed finite elements and conventional finite elements is investigated, and the solutions obtained from the conventional explicit finite element method are compared with analytical solutions to verify the numerical dispersion caused by the lumping approximation. Comparison of solutions obtained with the proposed finite elements to analytical solutions demonstrates the usefulness of the technique. Examples are also presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in earthquake ground motion modeling in the actual three‐dimensional crust structure. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Conservative semi-Lagrangian CIP technique for the shallow water equations

A new characteristic approach that guarantees the conservative property is proposed and is applied to the shallow water equations. CIP-CSL (Constrained Interpolation Profile/Conservative Semi-Lagrangian) interpolation is applied to the CIP method of characteristics in order to enhance the mass conservation of the numerical result. Although the characteristic formulation is originally derived from non-conservative form, present scheme achieves complete mass conservation by solving mass conservation simultaneously and reflecting conserving mass in interpolation profile. Present method has less height error compared to the CIP method of characteristics by several orders of magnitude. By the enhanced conservation property, present scheme is applicable to nonlinear problems, such as a shock problem. Furthermore, application to two dimensions including the Coriolis term is straightforward with directional splitting technique.     

Development of physically based meshes for two‐dimensional models of meandering channel flow

The choice of mesh generation and numerical solution strategies for two‐dimensional finite element models of fluvial flow have previously been based chiefly on experience and rule of thumb. This paper develops a rationale for the finite element modelling of flow in river channels, based on a study of flow around an annular reach. Analytical solutions of the two‐dimensional Shallow Water (St. Venant) equations are developed in plane polar co‐ordinates, and a comparison with results obtained from the TELEMAC‐2‐D finite element model indicates that of the two numerical schemes for the advection terms tested, a flux conservative transport scheme gives better results than a streamline upwind Petrov–Galerkin technique. In terms of mesh discretization, the element angular deviation is found to be the most significant control on the accuracy of the finite element solutions. A structured channel mesh generator is therefore developed which takes local channel curvature into account in the meshing process. Results indicate that simulations using curvature‐dependent meshes offer similar levels of accuracy to finer meshes made up of elements of uniform length, with the added advantage of improved model mass conservation in regions of high channel curvature. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A hybrid finite element formulation of the linear biphasic equations for hydrated soft tissue

A hybrid finite element method has been developed for application to the linear biphasic model of soft tissues. The biphasic model assumes that hydrated soft tissue is a mixture of two incompressible, immiscible phases, one solid and one fluid, and employs mixture theory to derive governing equations for its mechanical behaviour. These equations are time dependent, involving both fluid and solid velocities and solid displacement, and will be solved by spatial finite element and temporal finite difference approximation. The first step in the derivation of this hybrid method is application of a finite difference rule to the solid phase, thus obtaining equations with only velocities at discrete times as primary variables. A weighted residual statement of the temporally discretized governing equations, employing C° continuous interpolations of the solid and fluid phase velocities and discontinuous interpolations of the pore pressure and elastic stress, is then derived. The stress and pressure functions are chosen so that the total momentum equation of the mixture is satisfied; they are jointly referred to as an equilibrated stress and pressure field. The corresponding weighting functions are chosen to satisfy a relationship analogous to this equilibrium relation. The resulting matrix equations are symmetric. As an illustration of the hybrid biphasic formulation, six-noded triangular elements with complete linear, several incomplete quadratic, and complete quadratic stress and pressure fields in element local co-ordinates are developed for two dimensional analysis and tested against analytical solutions and a mixed-penalty finite element formulation of the same equations. The hybrid method is found to be robust and produce excellent results; preferred elements are identified on the basis of these results.     

The numerical solution of two-dimensional,steady flow problems by the finite element method

Finite element equivalents of the equations governing shearing and buoyancy driven flows are derived, and reduced to upwind forms suitable for the solution of problems in which the Reynolds and Rayleigh numbers are large. A modification to the central difference iterative method is studied which increases the Reynolds and Rayleigh numbers for which a central difference form may be used. A comparison is made between the results obtained using the central and upwind forms of the finite element method and those predicted by finite difference methods in the case of flow in a cavity. A mesh refinement study is made. The upwind forms of the finite element equations are applied to the solution of a complex flow problem involving the flow of glass in a throated furnace in the case of constant- and temperature- dependent viscosity and conductivity.     

Improvement of PUFEM for the numerical solution of high‐frequency elastic wave scattering on unstructured triangular mesh grids

The purpose of this paper, which builds on previous work (Int. J. Numer. Meth. Engng 2009; 77 :1646–1669), is to improve a numerical scheme based on the partition of unity finite element method (PUFEM) for the solution of the time harmonic elastic wave equations. The approach consists to approximate the displacement field by the standard finite element shape functions, enriched locally by superimposing pressure (P) and shear (S) plane waves. The aim is to accurately model two‐dimensional elastic wave problems on relatively coarse mesh grids, capable of containing many wavelengths per nodal spacing, for wide ranges of frequencies. This allows us to relax the traditional requirement of about 10 nodal points per S wavelength. In this work, an exact integration scheme for the linear triangular finite element is developed to evaluate the oscillatory integrals arising from the use of the PUFEM. The main contribution here consists in developing an explicit closed‐form solution for two‐dimensional wave‐based integrals, when the phase variation is linear in the local coordinate element system. The evaluation of the element mass matrix is performed from appropriate edge integrals. All other element matrices, obtained by adequate splitting of the element stress tensor matrix, are simply deduced from the element mass matrix entries. The results show clearly that the proposed integration scheme evaluates accurately the entries of the global matrix with drastic reduction of the computational time. Numerical tests dealing with the scattering of S elastic plane waves by a circular rigid body show that, for the same discretization level, it is possible to improve the accuracy by using large elements associated with high numbers of approximating plane waves rather than using small elements with less plane waves. However, this increases the conditioning and the fill‐in of the global matrix. At high frequency, it is even possible to push the number of degrees of freedom per S wavelength under 2 and still achieve good accuracy. Finally, some remarks on the choice of the numbers of P and S plane waves leading to better accuracy and conditioning are discussed. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.