FEA beginner, fundamental question
FEA beginner, fundamental question
(OP)
Hi, Ive just started reading a book on FE and it has a description of how FE theoretically works. It says that it creates truss members and approximates them as being springs and works out deflection according to Hookes law. My question is that it when the spring constant is represented as K=EA/L what values are used for the Area and the Length? Is it the length of the elements or the length of the whole object being analysed, and if it is the elements then what is the area of an element? I was always taught that a truss member had no cross sectional area. Any help you could offer is much appreciated, Thanks.





RE: FEA beginner, fundamental question
RE: FEA beginner, fundamental question
i think this question could have been clarified by reading a FE text book
RE: FEA beginner, fundamental question
RE: FEA beginner, fundamental question
this has got to be spelt out in an text book
RE: FEA beginner, fundamental question
The fundamental definition of a truss is that the loads can only be applied at the nodes- therefore the resulting internal forces can be idealized as pure axial loads. And Finite Element Analysis is the analysis of a defined structure- so you need to specify these parameters for each element for the analysis to be effective (and meaningful).
RE: FEA beginner, fundamental question
Have to agree with rb1957, this should be spelled out in virtually any textbook. I don't think any of us are prepared to teach FE101 over a web forum.
RE: FEA beginner, fundamental question