Hi everybody,
I am a new user of Mecway(I used FEA of other brands until now) and I would like to know how can give to a line of points(nodes) of a mesh, the follow constrain: a pinned support + displacement in an axys. How can I do it? In other words, I need give 2 DOF to that points(1 displacement+1rotation)
Thanks in advance.
Manuel.
Comments
Reducing all DOFS of an aligned set of nodes to two, requires a rigid body definition of those nodes. (Good moment to remind Victor about this possible improvement )
To keep them in an axis and all body free to rotate around that axis you need to set up the REF also aligned with the nodes.
You also need to *Transform ref and rot nodes to cylindrical coordinates. Then constrain all Ref and Rot except z.
Note the set of nodes will not be able to stretch in between them nor rotate as a whole if they are set up as rigid body.
The most general case, you have a powerful nonlinear *MPC Straight card in ccx. Also needs custom set up. Check manual 7.91 *MPC
NOTE: EDITED. Straight doesn't allow the nodes on the line to stretch and change distances in between them.NOTE: EDITED. Straight allow the nodes on the line to stretch and change distances in between them while keeping them aligned.
Thanks for your reply, but isn't there an easier way to add a typical roller restriction?
If you distribute the load over a certain surface below the plate you could use the rigid body as it is implemented (based on a surface and a REF node).
Mecway have shortcuts for some elaborated BC but not all of them.
Yeah, it coul be valid for small displacements. Unfortunately it is not what I need. Thank you so much!
I have edit one of my previous posts:
Straight allows the nodes on the line to stretch and change distances in between them while keeping them aligned.
But I might be misunderstanding because I think @disla's solution (Z displacement constraints) usually does this and should be fine for large displacements too, shouldn't it? Do you really want to make the line rigid so all its nodes together have only 2 degrees of freedom and it can't deform or rotate about the Z axis? That would physically be one big high-stiffness support fixing a strip on the surface, not a row of independent roller supports.
I'been doing this manually for a long time .
I think y rotation should be free to be a hinge.
The Y-rotation constraint is for the reference node (ROT node), but structure itself is free to rotate about the line of nodes because there's no way for a rigid body connecting displacement DOFs to constraint that motion.
I put in the Y rotation constraint on the advice of the CCX manual after it was failing without it. Your version also fails sometimes (Spooles). I think that extra constraint removes a redundant rigid body DOF caused by the nodes being collinear.
That's weird. I didn't notice that because I always use PARDISO MKL and it has been working fine for me. You are completely right. Adding rot y constrained makes it to work also with spools although it doesn't have any effect. Good to know for other users using different solvers.