Introduction

*CONSTRAINED_SPOTWELD
Spot Weld Secures Two Plates
LS-DYNA Manual Section: *CONSTRAINED_SPOTWELD

Additional Sections:
*BOUNDARY_PRESCRIBED_MOTION_SET
*DATABASE_CROSS_SECTION_PLANE
*DATABASE_CROSS_SECTION_SET

Example: Spot Weld Secures Two Plates

Filename: constrained.spotweld.plates.k

Description:
Two overlapping plates are connected using three spotwelds. The plates are
pulled apart until the spot welds reach the defined failure condition.

Model:
The two plates measure 80*40*1 mm3 and are defined with S/R Hughes-Liu
shell elements to control hourglassing. The location of the spotwelds
connecting the two plates is in the center of the overlapping section.
One end of the plate has fixed constraints and the other end of the other plate
has linearly increasing displacement.

Input:
The nodal point cards contain the boundary conditions at one end of the plate
(* NODES). *BOUNDARY_PRESCRIBED_MOTION_SET defines the nodal motion of the end
of the other plate. Massless beams simulate the connection between the plates
at three loc ations (*CONSTRAINED_SPOTWELD). The definitions include failure
as a function of the axial and shear force.

The ASCII file swforc contains the axial and shear forces on the spotweld
(*DATABASE_SWFORC). A cross section is defined through each of the plates
using two different techniques (*DATABASE_CROSS_SECTION_PLANE,
*DATABASE_CROSS_SECTION_SET). Forces and moments through the cross sections
are stored in the ASCII file secforc (*DATABASE_SECFORC).