Ok, but there is also a stiffness change in the material with a change in temp. How does this factor in? The model is effectively using a higher spring rate at a lower temperature and this increase in stiffness is dwarfing the effect of thermal contraction. Intuitively it does not seem right...
I am modeling a gasket that is initially being compressed in a threaded joint at room temperature and then undergoes a thermal change to -40 deg C. I have created an FEA model to simulate this and extract the reaction forces and contact pressures generated by the gasket at the two temps. I am...
