Exercise 11: Deformation of C-Bar
Exercise 11: Deformation of C-Bar
Exercise 11
Deformation of C-Bar
11-1 Introduction
As described in Exercise 8, the C-shaped steel bar is used to measure the magnitude of a force P [1]. A strain gauge is bonded to the surface of the location as shown [2]. The location is chosen because the strain is large and distributed quite uniformly, so that the measured strain is not sensitive to the variation of the location of the strain gauge. The measured strain is then used to calculate the force P. The idea also relies on the fact that the strain is linearly proportional to the force P, which is true when the deformation is small enough. In other words, if the measured strain is doubled, then the force must be doubled. In this section, we will assume a force of P = 2,000 N, and perform a simulation to see how the body deforms. The students will learn not only the procedure of a simple simulation but the meaning of displacements. P [5] The two systems share the same <Geometry>. You can edit up-stream cell but not the downstream cell.
11-2 Start Up
[2] Open the project "CBar," which was saved in Exercise 8.
[3] Drag <Static Structural> and drop to <Geometry> cell of the <Geometry> system. [1] Launch Workbench
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[7] <Mechanical> GUI shows up. If your GUI layout is not like this, pull-down-select <View/ Windows/Reset Layout> and select <Graphics> tab., see [8].
[8] Whenever necessary, pulldown-select <View/Windows/ Reset Layout> and select <Graphics> tab to bring back the "standard" layout.
Like DesignModeler, <Mechanical> is an application module of the Workbench. In this book, we will use DesignModeler to build geometric models, while use <Mechanical> to perform the rest of simulation tasks. Appendix B provides a quick reference for the use of <Mechanical>. Also, unlike DesignModeler, the units in the <Mechanical> can be changed any time. For an overview of unit systems, see B-4.
[3] In the <Details>, select <Fine> for <Relevance Center> and type "75" for <Relevance>.
[6] Number of nodes and elements are shown in the Details view. Your numbers may not be the same as here. Also note that in an academic teaching version of ANSYS Workbench, either the number of nodes or the number of elements is limited up to 30,000.
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Meshing
The process of dividing a body into small bodies is call meshing. The small bodies are called elements, or nite elements. The simulation method is thus called nite element simulation. The basic idea of nite element simulations is to divide a body of rather complicated geometry into smaller elements of simple geometry, and the elements are assumed to be connected to each other through nodes. The element's geometry is so simple that a set of equations may be established easily for each element. All equations are then solve simultaneously for the displacements. Strains are then calculated from the displacements. And stresses are in turn calculated from the strains. We will introduce displacements in this exercise, and will discuss how ANSYS calculates the strains and stresses in the latter exercises. In general, the ner the mesh, the more accurate the solution (and more computing time). In this book, we will control the mesh size by simply adjusting <Relevance Center> and <Relevance> (see B-3). Also, note that the Workbench will automatically generate a mesh right before it solves the problem if a mesh doesn't exist.
[5] Select <Loads/ Force>. [6] Select this inner cylindrical surface.
[8] Select <Components> for <Dene By> and type -2,000 (N) for <Y Component>.
[9] Highlight <Static Structural> to view the environment conditions. [10] We've added these two environment conditions.
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[2] Select <Deformation/ Total> to insert a <Total Deformation> result object. Leave the settings in the details view as their default values.
[3] Select <Deformation/ Direction> to insert a <Directional Deformation> result object. [4] Leave the settings in the details view as their default values.
[9] Select the three result objects as shown and right-click-select <Rename Based on Denition>.
[11] Click <Solve>. It takes less than one minute to solve the model.
[10] The three objects have been renamed for better readability.
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[5] Note that the deformation is automatically scaled for better visual effect. [2] Colors are used to show the magnitude of the displacement.
[1] Highlight <Total Deformation>. [3] Ranges of each color are shown in the legend. Note that your numerical values may not be exactly the same as here. [4] Click <Play> to animate the deformation.
[7] Move the mouse cursor over the model and notice that the displacement values display on the screen. The <Probe> tool enables you to display numerical results at any locations.
[8] Point the mouse cursor at this corner and click the left button to put a "label" on the model. The total displacement at this corner is 0.45316. Your value may not be exactly the same as here. To remove a label, see Appendix B-11[7-8].
[11] Point the mouse cursor at the same corner and click the left button to put a label. The Xcomponent of the displacement at this corner is -0.22338 mm. Your value may not be exactly the same as here.
[9] Highlight <X Axis - Directional Deformation>. [14] Point the mouse cursor at the same corner and click the left button to put a label. The Y-component of the displacement at this corner is -0.39421 mm. Your value may not be exactly the same as here.
[12] Highlight <Y Axis - Directional Deformation>. [17] Point the mouse cursor at the same corner and click the left button to put a label. The Z-component of the displacement at this corner is -0.00002 mm. Your value may not be exactly the same as here.
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11-7 Summary
The purpose of this exercise is to familiar with the meaning of displacements. Let's summarized what we have learned about displacements in this section.
Directional Displacements
As a vector quantity, a displacement can be decomposed into three components in 3D space. In this case, the displacement at the corner (11-6[8]) can be decomposed into X-component (-0.22338 mm, see 11-6[11]), Ycomponent (-0.39421 mm, see 11-6[14]), and Z-component (-0.00002 mm, see 11-6[17]). These three components are call directional displacements.
11-8 Wrap Up
Close <Mechanical>, save the project, and exit <Workbench>.