Search results for "Mechanical engineering"

Digital image correlation analysis of interfacial debonding properties and fracture behavior in concrete

2007

The use of digital image correlation (DIC) as a fracture mechanics tool is described, for two projects currently underway. The goal of the first project is to examine the bond between carbon fiber reinforced polymers (CFRP) and concrete substrates. The second project involves the interfacial transition zone (ITZ) of plain concrete, and the softening and fracture behavior of this region. For both projects, DIC allows for precise measurement of the surface displacements of the deforming materials. The resulting strain data are higher in resolution than is possible with other experimental techniques. For both projects, the DIC results are being used to determine bond constitutive laws, which w…

Numerical analysis of masonry structures via interface models

2001

The present paper is devoted to the theoretical formulation and numerical implementation of an interface model suitable to simulate the behavior of mortar joints in masonry structures. The interface laws are formulated in the framework of elasto-plasticity for non-standard materials in order to simulate the softening response which occurs along the decohesion process in presence of shear and tension tractions. A variable material dilatancy parameter is introduced together with a further geometrical dilatancy related to the roughness of contact surfaces after joint fracture. An asperity model is adopted with the aim to describe the evolution of the contact surface shape during the loss of co…

Damage and plasticity at the interfaces in composite materials and structures

2009

Abstract The structural behavior at the interface between two surfaces of ductile, brittle or quasi-brittle materials is studied by a new analytical elastoplastic damaging model. The model is developed in the framework of a thermodynamically consistent theory. The Helmholtz free energy is written to predict the materials’ hardening or softening. An isotropic damage is considered and the possible effects of dilatancy are taken into account including non-associative flow rules. The interface laws are presented both in a rate and a discrete incremental form. The analytical formulation is then implemented into a finite element code and two structural members are studied to validate the model. T…

Dipolar NLO-phores with large off-diagonal components of the second-order polarizability tensor

1997

Digital signal processing for rail monitoring by means of ultrasonic guided waves

2007

Recent train accidents have reaffirmed the need for developing rail defect detection systems that are more effective than those used today. One of the recent developments in rail inspection is the use of ultrasonic guided waves (UGWs) and non-contact probing techniques to target transverse-type defects. Besides the obvious advantages of non-contact probing, that include robustness and a potential for large inspection speed, such a system can theoretically detect transverse defects under horizontal shelling or head checks. This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of digital signal processing to enhance the damage detection sensitivity of the non-contact system. The method proposed here comb…

A meshfree method for transverse vibrations of anisotropic plates

2003

A meshfree approach, called displacement boundary method, for anisotropic Kirchhoff plate dynamic analysis is presented. This method is deduced from a variational principle, which uses a modified hybrid functional involving the generalized displacements and generalized tractions on the boundary and the lateral deflection in the domain as independent variables. The discretization process is based on the employment of the fundamental solutions of the static problem operator for the expression of the variables involved in the functional. The stiffness and mass matrices obtained for the dynamic model are frequency-independent, symmetric and positive definite and their computation involves bound…

The symmetric boundary element method for unilateral contact problems

2008

Abstract On the basis of the boundary integral equation method, in its symmetric formulation, the frictionless unilateral contact between two elastic bodies has been studied. A boundary discretization by boundary elements leads to an algebraic formulation in the form of a linear complementarity problem. In this paper the process of contact or detachment is obtained through a step by step analysis by using generalized (weighted) quantities as the check elements: the detachment or the contact phenomenon may happen when the weighted traction or the weighted displacement is greater than the weighted cohesion or weighted minimum reference gap, respectively. The applications are performed by usin…

The Line Element-less Method Analysis of orthotropic beam for the De Saint Venant torsion problem

2010

Abstract This paper deals with the extension of a novel numerical technique, labelled line element-less method (LEM), in order to provide approximate solutions of the De Saint Venant torsion problem for orthotropic beams having simply and multiply connected cross-section. A suitable transformation of coordinates allows to take full advantage of the theory of analytic complex functions as in the isotropic case. A complex potential function analytic in all the transformed domain whose real and imaginary parts are related to the shear stress components and to the orthotropic ratio is introduced and expanded in the double-ended Laurent series involving harmonic polynomials. An element-free weak…

Line element-less method (LEM) for beam torsion solution (truly no-mesh method)

2008

In this paper a new numerical method for finding approximate solutions of the torsion problem is proposed. The method takes full advantage of the theory of analytic complex function. A new potential function directly in terms of shear stresses is proposed and expanded in the double-ended Laurent series involving harmonic polynomials. A novel element-free weak form procedure, labelled Line Element-Less Method (LEM), has been developed imposing that the square of the net flux across the border is minimum with respect to coefficients expansion. Numerical implementation of the LEM results in systems of linear algebraic equations involving symmetric and positive-definite matrices without resorti…

Symmetric Galerkin Boundary Element Methods

1998

This review article concerns a methodology for solving numerically, for engineering purposes, boundary and initial-boundary value problems by a peculiar approach characterized by the following features: the continuous formulation is centered on integral equations based on the combined use of single-layer and double-layer sources, so that the integral operator turns out to be symmetric with respect to a suitable bilinear form. The discretization is performed either on a variational basis or by a Galerkin weighted residual procedure, the interpolation and weight functions being chosen so that the variables in the approximate formulation are generalized variables in Prager’s sense. As main con…