Finite Element Crush Analysis of Structural Components and Experimental Validations

The present paper concerns the application of the nonlinear finite element method to the crushing problem of structural components and the experimental validations. The lower-order finite elements based on the reduced integration technique are employed with the updated Lagrangian formulation in the developed computer codes. The tube components will be analyzed under the following loading conditions: (i) circular tubes under lateral compression, (ii) square tubes under lateral compression, (iii) toroidal shells under lateral compression, (iv) circular tubes under axial compression, (v) square tubes under axial compression, (vi) circular tubes under lateral loading. The numerical results will be compared with the results of the crush tests conducted by the authors.