Award

Fracture Analysis Consultants (FAC) proposes to develop a 3D, boundary element-based system for detailed stress analysis of composite joints. The FRANC3D system will be able to model bolted and bonded joints of arbitrary geometry, and include clamping and contact stresses from bolts. The system will also accommodate any number of discrete cracks in arbitrary locations and orientations in the joint, and simulate the arbitrary growth and interaction of such defects, automatically updating the mesh with each change in geometry. The FRANC3D system is based on a topological database which efficiently integrates and controls object-oriented solid modeling, automatic mesh generation and modification, a boundary element analysis (BEM) engine, fracture analysis, and a full range of results visualization. The BEM engine will be based on a new Symmetric-Galerkin, hypersingular formulation which will substantially increase efficiency for large 3D problems, while retaining the ability to model cracks with a single domain approach. The main goal of Phase I will be to demonstrate our capabilities in BEM formulation, solution of benchmark 2D problems, and 3D contact stress analysis. In Phase II we will concentrate on 3D BEM engine development and on simulation of crack growth.