Yield design of engineering structures based on an efficient elastic compensation method.

This paper investigates a lower-bound limit analysis procedure that conducts sequential Cell-based Smoothed Finite Element (CS-FE) analyses within an effective elastic compensation method to assess the ultimate loading capacity well-known as a limit load of perfectly-plastic engineering structures. In essence, the one-subcell version of the four-node CS-FEM which addresses the incompressibility locking issue with ease is adopted. This is of great importance as the criss-cross typed meshes are no longer mandatory such as those would be required when using linear three-node elements. Additionally, the present iterative modulus variation procedure enhanced by stress recovery techniques allows the yield conformity to be satisfied over an entire Q4 element through a series of elastic solving analyses resulting in the stability and fast convergence of collapse loads. Consequently, step-by-step intricate inelastic analyses are eliminated, and hence the computational cost is significantly lower. Two numerical examples demonstrate the efficiency and robustness of the proposed yield design approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]