Beam bending around a rigid analytical cylinder

[oldstone99]

Hello,

I am rather new to ABAQUS CAE and I have been trying to resolve this problem for the past two weeks (asked every one I know but not many people have working knowledge on ABAQUS).

I have a deformable beam of an isotopic elastic material that I am trying to bend into a circular shape (with two ends of the beam touching each other). I put a boundary conditions on the beam: fixed centre, surface contact with the cylinder (it prompts the beam to bend around it) and pull forces on ends of the beam.
So far I managed to make it bend around the cylinder and start to pull together but when I add a third step (where I instruct surface contact to be initiated between the two ends of the beam) to make the beam finish it's path around the cylinder, the job produces errors.

In the end I need to make my beam twist into the following shape (see below) and so far I am nowhere near close to that.

 

[oldstone99]

I have a deformable beam of an isotopic elastic material that I am trying to bend into a circular shape (with two ends of the beam touching each other). I put a boundary conditions on the beam: fixed centre, surface contact with the cylinder (it prompts the beam to bend around it) and pull forces on ends of the beam.
So far I managed to make it bend around the cylinder and start to pull together but when I add a third step (where I instruct surface contact to be initiated between the two ends of the beam) to make the beam finish it's path around the cylinder, the job produces errors.

1
2
3

In the end I need to make my beam twist into the following shape (see below) and so far I am nowhere near close to that.
4
5
6

 

[corus]

Looks like you are using C3D8R elements which cause hour glassing. Change them to C3D8 elements to get better results. Make sure you have NLGEOM=yes. You'll also need to have plasticity too if you want any meaningful results. Initiating contact won't make surfaces join. You'll have to just apply forces so that they do meet or apply fixed displacements. Also you can halve the model as it has symmetry or more simply just use a 2D plane strain or 2D plane stress model.