ANALYSIS OF NONLINEAR DYNAMICS OF SHELLS USING AN INVARIANT-BASED TRIANGULAR SHELL ELEMENT

It is proposed to use a curvilinear triangular finite element with a small number of degrees of freedom to reduce the computational effort in the numerical solution of problems of nonlinear dynamics of shells using time-stepping integration. Compactness of the finite-element formulation is achieved by applying strain-tensor invariants. In this case, the natural strain components determined in the directions of three coordinate lines parallel to the sides of the element are used. Solutions describing large displacements, rotations, and buckling dynamics are given to demonstrate the capabilities of the proposed finite-element model.