Patent ID: 8209157

Claim:
A method of simulating a beam element in contact with a surface mesh in finite element analysis comprising: receiving, in a computer system, a finite element analysis model having at least one beam element and at least one surface mesh, to represent one or more objects to be contacted with each other, wherein each of the at least one beam element having first and second end nodes, and the at least one surface mesh contains a plurality of two-dimensional finite elements; establishing a minimum characteristic length (CL) of the at least one surface mesh; creating one or more interior points between the first and second end nodes of said each of the at least one beam element in accordance with a formula as a function of the minimum CL, when said each of the at least one beam element's length is longer than the minimum CL; calculating a set of contact resisting forces at each nodal point along said each of the at least one beam element, said each nodal point is one of said first and second end nodes and said one or more interior points, wherein each of the set of contact resisting forces includes a compensational force counterbalancing an initial interpenetration distance with the at least one surface mesh at said each nodal point; and conducting a time-marching engineering simulation in the computer system using the finite element model using a finite element analysis including contact effects via an intermittent global search in conjunction with a local search to determine which one of said first and second end nodes and said one or more interior points is in contact with each of the plurality of two-dimensional finite elements, the time-marching engineering simulation's results are presented to a user via an output interface coupled to the computer system such that the user can use the results to make decision in improvement of an engineering product design, wherein the time-marching engineering simulation contains a plurality of solution cycles.