Patent ID: 6704693
Filing Date: 2004-03-09
Classification: G06F,G06T

Abstract:
A method for analysing the structural response of an object having an outer surface comprising a plurality of surface portions, involving:forming a three dimensional model of said object, said model comprising a surface mesh representative of said outer surface and comprising a plurality of eccentric shell elements, wherein each of said elements is defined by a plurality of nodes on said surface and each of said nodes has one or more degrees of freedom; assigning to each of said elements a thickness indicative of half of the thickness of said object at said respective element; defining, for each of said elements, a reference surface that includes the nodes of said respective element and that is coincident with said surface mesh at said respective element; for a pair of opposed portions of said surface, establishing a constraining relationship between said degrees of freedom of each of said nodes on the first of said opposed portions and said degrees of freedom of one or more of the nodes on the second of said opposed portions; performing a finite element structural analysis of said object; and outputting one or more results of said structural analysis.