Curved (degenerated) shell elements

[peto24ap]

Hi,

I have written a code for analysis of curved shell structures using Ahmed/Irons/Zienkiewicz degenerated shell element. Now I would like to connect it to a more complex structure with beams and trusses. Degenerated shell elements have 5 degrees of freedom in node (3 translations wrt global axes and 2 rotations around local axes). Typical 3D beam element have 6 degrees of freedom (3 translations and 3 rotations wrt global axes. Is there any way how to connect these elements ? I think that I am missing some transformation matrix that can turn 2 rotations around local axes of shell element to 2 (or 3) rotations around global axes which can be coupled (summed) with rotations of other elements.

Thank you

 

[ShellsPlatesMeshes]

Your algorithm must perform a number of operations, using the matrix of directional cosines. The full algorithm and its source codes can be found in the following book: "Computational Geometry of Surfaces and Its Application to the Finite Element Analysis of Shells" by O.Axenenko and A.Tsvelikh (the book is available on Amazon.com). The algorithm itself is described on pages 227-231. Actually, the book also contains complete formulas and codes implementing a shell element based on the Kirchhoff-Love theory (and that element is free of shear locking). The authors of the book have a dedicated webpage:

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~comecau/quad_shell.htm

Hope this helps.