ABSTRACT
Engineering designs involve 3-D structures that cannot be adequately represented using 1-D or 2-D models. Solid elements based on 3-D elasticity [10,11] are the most general elements for stress analysis when the simplified bar, beam, plane stress/strain, plate/shell elements are no longer valid or accurate. In general, 3-D structural analysis is one of the most important and powerful ways of providing insight into the behavior of an engineering design. In this chapter, we will review the elasticity equations for 3-D and then discuss a few types of finite elements commonly used for 3-D stress analysis. Several different types of supports, loads, and contact constraints will be introduced for 3-D structural modeling, followed by a case study on predicting the deformation and stresses in an assembly structure using ANSYS® Workbench.
