Solving analysis problems

A large class of stress analysis problems can be solved with Abaqus/Standard and Abaqus/Explicit. A fundamental division of such problems is into static or dynamic response; dynamic problems are those in which inertia effects are significant.

An analysis problem history is defined using steps in Abaqus (Defining an analysis). For each step you choose an analysis procedure, which defines the type of analysis to be performed during the step. The available analysis procedures are listed below and described in more detail in the referenced sections.

Abaqus provides multiphysics capabilities using built-in fully coupled procedures, sequential coupling, and co-simulation as solution techniques for multiphysics simulation. An extensive selection of additional analysis techniques that provide powerful tools for performing your Abaqus analyses more efficiently and effectively is available; see Analysis Techniques.

The following topics are discussed:

Abaqus/Standard analysis

Abaqus/Standard offers complete flexibility in making the distinction between static and dynamic response; the same analysis can contain several static and dynamic phases. Thus, a static preload might be applied, and then the linear or nonlinear dynamic response computed (as in the case of vibrations of a component of a rotating machine or the response of a flexible offshore system that is initially moved to an equilibrium position subject to buoyancy and steady current loads and then is excited by wave loading). Similarly, the static solution can be sought after a dynamic event (by following a dynamic analysis step with a step of static loading). See Static stress/displacement analysis and Dynamic stress/displacement analysis for information on these types of procedures. In addition to static and dynamic stress analysis, Abaqus/Standard offers the following analysis types:

Abaqus/Explicit analysis

Abaqus/Explicit solves dynamic response problems using an explicit direct-integration procedure. See Dynamic stress/displacement analysis for more information on the explicit dynamic procedures available in Abaqus. Abaqus/Explicit also provides heat transfer, acoustic, and annealing analysis capabilities: see Heat transfer and thermal-stress analysis, Acoustic, shock, and coupled acoustic-structural analysis, and Annealing for details.

Multiphysics analyses

Multiphysics is a coupled approach in the numerical solution of multiple interacting physical domains. Abaqus provides built-in fully coupled procedures, sequential coupling, and co-simulation as solution techniques for multiphysics simulation.

Built-in fully coupled procedures

Native Abaqus multiphysics capabilities solve the physics by adding degrees of freedom representing each of the physical fields and using a single solver. Abaqus provides the following built-in fully coupled procedures to solve multidisciplinary simulations, where all physics fields are computed by Abaqus:

Sequential coupling

A sequentially coupled multiphysics analysis can be used when the coupling between one or more of the physical fields in a model is only important in one direction. A common example is a thermal-stress analysis in which the temperature field does not depend strongly on the stress field. A typical sequentially coupled thermal-stress analysis consists of two Abaqus/Standard runs: a heat transfer analysis and a subsequent stress analysis.

You can perform sequentially coupled multiphysics analyses in Abaqus/Standard as described in the following sections:

Co-simulation

The co-simulation technique is a multiphysics capability for run-time coupling of Abaqus and another analysis program. An Abaqus analysis can be coupled to another Abaqus analysis or to a third-party analysis program to perform multidisciplinary simulations and multidomain (multimodel) coupling.

The co-simulation technique is described in the following sections: