A Loose Coupling Multiscale Approach for the Detailed Analysis of the Influence of Critical Areas on the Global Behaviour of Composite Structures

Abstract

In this paper, a loose coupling multiscale modeling technique for the detailed numerical analysis of critical areas in composite structures is presented. It is used to describe the global (macroscopic) behaviour of composite structures taking into account the effects of local phenomena. This is done by indirectly connecting the global and local FE-models. Prescribed displacements are assigned to the local boundaries in the transition from the global to local modeling level. The local-to-global transition is realized by assigning averaged local stresses to the respective global Gauss points and by updating the global tangent stiffness operator. To illustrate the feasibility of the approach and to verify its implementation in the commercial FE code ABAQUSTM by user-defined subroutines and scripts, a test case for a solid-to-solid coupling has been investigated. A comparison of the results of the multiscale approach with numerical reference solutions shows that the implementation works appropriate.