Due to the evolving nature of the engineering analysis and simulation market this publication no longer represents current best practice and has been archived. The document may be of historical interest and is therefore still available for purchase.

This document reports the work performed under the NAFEMS contract NEL/F/521 entitled “Review of Benchmark Problems for 3-D Beams and Shells with Geometric Non-linearity”. The object of the work is to produce a compendium of problems which are suitable to be worked up as benchmarks for 3-dimensional beam and shell finite element assemblies. Recommendations are also made for a necessary and sufficient set of such benchmarks. The work is focussed on 3-dimensional geometric non-linearity of beams and shells, but 2-demensional behaviour and the effects of time independent material non-linearity (i.e. plasticity) are not excluded. Creep effects however are not pursued. This would require a separate study.

Although the role of benchmarks in the finite element community is becoming well established, some explanation of “suitability” and hence the criteria used for assessing candidate problems is necessary. This is provided in Section 2.

Section 3 then describes the organisation of the work. This follows very closely then spirit and intent of an earlier contract dealing with material non-linearity(*) and he was arranged in 3 stages namely:

• Stage 1 Search for suitable problems
• Stage 2 Collation, classification and critical review
• Stage 3 Identification and reporting of a sufficient set of problems

In Section 4 the classification of potential problems into three groups, namely Beams, Shells and Branched Shells is explained. All the problems have been assigned a ranking from 1 to 4, according to that degree to which they satisfy the selection criteria, and this is also explained in Section 4.

Section 5 discusses the various physical attributes of the non-linear behaviour of beam and shell assemblies and hence the extent of the required benchmarks. Each problem is summaries on a single sheet in Appendix 2. The aim here is to present only the key physical features of each test sufficient to allow the reader to decide on its relevance. Fully detailed references are contained in Section 7.

Contents

INTRODUCTION

SCOPE OF WORK

• General Purpose of Benchmark Tests
  
• Area of Application: Scope of Nonlinearity
  
• Criteria for Selection
  

SEARCH FOR BENCHMARK PROBLEMS

• Methods of Search
  
• Results of Search
  

CLASSIFICATION, RANKING AND PRESENTATION OF THE PROBLEMS

• Classification
  
• Ranking
  
• Presentation of the Potential Benchmarks
  

ATTRIBUTES OF POTENTIAL BENCHMARKS

• Beams
  
• Shells
  

RECOMMENDED PROBLEMS AND FURTHER WORK

• Recommended Benchmarks
  
• Further Work
  

REFERENCES

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

APPENDICES

• Appendix 1 : Index and Attributes
  
• Appendix 2 : Potential Benchmarks
  
• Appendix 3 ; Recommended Subset