Chapter 5

Strip with Hole and Slit.

As a next example we consider the analysis of a tension strip which contains a hole
but has a slit between the hole and the right boundary as shown in Figure 5.1. The
strip is to be loaded by applying vertical displacements along the top and bottom. The
possibility of having different materials for the top and bottom halves is anticipated
and, thus, the entire mesh needs to be constructed.

Figure 5.1: Tension Strip with Hole and Slit

To construct the mesh a set of 8 blocks of nodes and elements will be constructed
and merged to form the final analysis. Since the mesh has a considerable amount
of symmetry it is proposed to generate the two blocks for one quadrant using the
BLOCk mesh command and then use the TRANsformation command to form the other
quadrants. The steps to form the mesh may be summarized as follows.

1. Assign REGIon 1 as the first quadrant.

2. Use the BLOCk command to form the two blocks for the first quadrant. Save the
mesh for the first quadrant in a file called IHQUAD.

30
CHAPTER 5. STRIP WITH HOLE AND SLIT 31

3. Use an INCLude, IHQUAD in a problem data file (e.g., file ISTRIP) to import the
data for quadrant 1 (see Chapter 4 of the User Manual for more information on
use of the include option.
4. Assign the second and third quadrants to REGIon 2.

5. Set the TRANsformation to reflect the x-axis and use an INCLude, tt IHQUAD
to generate the 2 blocks for the second quadrant. Note that since the coordi-
nate transformation is not a rotation the generated elements may have negative
volume.
6. Set the TRANsformation to reflect the x-axis and y-axes. Use an INCLude, IHQUAD
to generate the 2 blocks for the third quadrant.
7. Assign the fourth quadrants to REGIon 3.

8. Set the TRANsformation to reflect y-axes. Use an INCLude, IHQUAD to generate

the 2 blocks for the fourth quadrant.

The commands to perform the transformations and read the include files are summa-
rized in Figure 5.2.
The outlines for all the blocks formed after this step are shown in Figure 5.3. It is
necessary now to merge these blocks to form the final mesh, while retaining the slit,
which if not properly treated will be merged also during the use of a TIE command.
It is at this time that the utility of the REGIon descriptions is used. A summary of the
merge order is as follows

1. Merge each of the regions with itself. The result of this step is shown in Figure
5.4.

2. Merge region 1 with region 2; also merge region 2 with region 3. This will produce
the final mesh whose outline was shown in Figure 5.1.

The TIE commands to achieve these two steps are:

TIE,REGIon,1,1
TIE,REGIon,2,2
TIE,REGIon,3,3
TIE,REGIon,1,2
TIE,REGIon,2,3

The generation of the two blocks forming each quadrant is achieved using the commands
shown in Figure 5.5.
CHAPTER 5. STRIP WITH HOLE AND SLIT 32

FEAP * * Tension Strip With Hole and Slit

0,0,0,2,2,4
PARAmeters
d=1 ! First node number
e=1 ! First element number
m=1 ! Material set number
n=8 ! Size of blocks
! Terminator
REGIon,1 ! Assigns 1st quadrant to region 1
INCLude,IHQUAD ! Input first quadrant
PARAmeters
d=0 ! To make feap count nodes
e=0 ! To make feap count elements
! Terminator
REGIon,2 ! Assign 2nd and 3rd quadrant
TRANsform ! Reverse x axis for second quadrant
-1,0,0
0,1,0
0,0,1
0,0,0
INCLude,IHQUAD
TRANsform ! Reverse x,y axis for third quadrant
-1,0,0
0,-1,0
0,0,1
0,0,0
INCLude,IHQUAD
REGIon,3 ! Assign 4th quadrant to region 3
TRANsform ! Reverse y axis for fourth quadrant
1,0,0
0,-1,0
0,0,1
0,0,0
INCLude,IHQUAD
END

Figure 5.2: Region, Transformation, and Include Structure

CHAPTER 5. STRIP WITH HOLE AND SLIT 33

Figure 5.3: Tension Strip: Block Structure Before Merges

Figure 5.4: Tension Strip: After Merge of Each Region with Itself

Finally, the displacements on the top and bottom edges are specified using the com-
mands given in Figure 5.6.
An analysis using this data produced the results for the σyy stress shown in Figure 5.
Since no explicit use of node element numbers appears in any of the data it is possible
to run a number of problems using the same data but different values for the mesh gen-
eration parameter n. Indeed all problems may be performed during the same execution
of the program by defining a master input file, say ISLIT which has the values for the
parameters. The file ISLIT can contain the data shown in Fig. 5.8. It is necessary to
remove the definition of the parameter n from the ISTRIP file. It is further assumed
that the solution commands are also contained in the ISTRIP file or in a file which is
referenced by an include file. Finally, no STOP command should be referenced by the
ISTRIP file. FEAP will perform all three problems and place the output sequentially
in the file named OSLIT.
The same methodology also may be used to run a sequence of different problems. In
CHAPTER 5. STRIP WITH HOLE AND SLIT 34

PARAm
c=cosd(45.0)
s=sind(45.0)
a=cosd(22.5)
b=sind(22.5)
! Termination
BLOCk
CART,n,n,d,e,m
1,1,0
2,6,0
3,6,8
4,s,c
5,2.6,0
7,2.1,2.8
8,a,b
9,2.5,1.2
! Termination
BLOCk
CART,n,n,0,0,m
1,s,c
2,6,8
3,0,8
4,0,1
5,2.1,2.8
7,0,3.1
8,b,a
9,1.1,3.0
! Termination

Figure 5.5: Tension Strip with Slit: Block Generation of Quadrant

EBOUndary
2 8 0 1 0
2 -8 0 1 0
! Termination
CBOUndary
node -6 0 1 0
! Termination
EDISplacements
2 8 0 0.5
2 -8 0 -0.5
! Termination
MATErial 1
SOLId
ELAStic ISOTopic 10000 0.25
! Termination

Figure 5.6: Tension Strip with Slit: Boundary and Material Parameters
CHAPTER 5. STRIP WITH HOLE AND SLIT 35

STRESS 2
Min = -1.17E+02
Max = 2.32E+03

2.31E+02
5.79E+02
9.26E+02
1.27E+03
1.62E+03
1.97E+03

Current View
Min = -1.17E+02
X = 5.94E+00
Y =-7.10E+00

Max = 2.32E+03
X =-1.01E+00
Y = 4.26E-18

Figure 5.7: Tension Strip with Slit: Contours of σyy

PARAmeter
n = 4
INCLude ISTRIP
PARAmeter
n = 8
INCLude ISTRIP
PARAmeter
n = 16

INCLude ISTRIP
STOP

Figure 5.8: Include data for tension strip refinements

CHAPTER 5. STRIP WITH HOLE AND SLIT 36

this case a reference by the include statement would name each of the problem files to
be solved.