3.

1 Crash analysis

33

Numerical stability
Central difference scheme is conditionally stable so the time step t is restricted. The
shell time step required for stability is computed by PAM-CRASH as follows, [17]:
h

i
tshell = kMIN L/c min 1.0, L3h for BEND active;
tshell = kMIN [L/c]for NOBEND active;
where,
k is the scale factor for the time step;
MIN is the minimum over all shell elements;
L is the characteristic length;
c is the speed of sound,
p
E/ for NONU active,
p
c = E/(1 2 ) for NU active;

c=

h is the shell thickness;

is the mass density;
E is the Yougs modulus.
Remark: If a damping ratio (KSI
in the material properties, tshell stable

p) has been specified
2
1 + , [17].
time step is reduced by factor
Time step calculation
Generally the smallest time step of all elements in a model is used for the time-integration.
For 2D (shells) and 3D (solids) elements the time step calculation is based on a characteristic
length. There are two time step criterias available in PAM-CRASH, [17]:
Standard time step criteria (LARGE): the standard time step criteria for quadrilateral,
degenerate quadrilateral, triangular and C triangular shell elements are based on the
elastic wave travel time along the characteristic lengths illustrated in Figure 3.3. Use of
the standard time step criteria usually results in time steps larger than the ones obtained
from the stringent criteria, [17].
Stringent time step criteria (SMALL): the stringent time step criteria for shells are
based on the elastic wave travel time along the characteristic lengths illustrated in
Figure 3.4, [17].
The stringent time step criteria should assure solution stability in severe cases (very distorted meshes, etc), where the economical standard criteria may become inadequate, [17].
The use of stringent time step criteria may sometimes considerably reduce the solution
time step with respect to the solution time step from the standard criteria, [17].