1.17.

2 Sensitivity of the stress concentration factor around a circular hole in a

plate under uniaxial tension
Products: Abaqus/Standard Abaqus/Design
The design sensitivity analysis capability in Abaqus is illustrated for a uniaxially loaded plate
with a hole. In particular, the sensitivity of the stress concentration to a change in the shape of
the hole from circular to elliptical is studied. Since an analytical solution exists, the results are
easily verified.

Problem description
Taking advantage of symmetry, a quarter of a linear elastic square plate with a circular
hole is modeled with CPS4 elements. The radius of the hole is 10 units. To simulate an
infinite sheet, the plate width is set to 40 times the radius of the hole. A uniaxial tensile
pressure P equal to 100 units is applied to the plate in the 2-direction during a linear
static step in Abaqus/Standard. The finite element model is shown in Figure 1.17.21.
The linear static step is followed by a static perturbation step where the load is
perturbed by 50 units. Since this problem is linear, the perturbation should produce a
sensitivity that is scaled by half.
We wish to study the effect of changing the shape of the hole from circular to elliptical
on the maximum absolute stress,
; therefore, the nodal coordinates need to be
related to the shape of the hole. Based on experience, the effect of a perturbation in the
shape of the hole on the nodal coordinates lying outside the shaded region (shown in
Figure 1.17.21) can be neglected. The circular hole can be regarded as a special case
of an ellipse with its major axis lying along the x-axis. Let a and b represent the semimajor and semi-minor axes, respectively; and consider a point with coordinates
lying on a circle concentric to the hole. The coordinates of this point can be
parameterized as
and
, where and are
constants and represents the angle (measured from the positive x-axis) of the position
vector to the point from the center of the circle. If the point lies on the boundary of the
hole,
. Positive values of and move the point into the interior of the
plate. The dependence of the nodal coordinates on the parameter a is specified by
providing the gradients of x and y with respect to a on the *PARAMETER SHAPE
VARIATION option. The gradients are given as

and

Results and discussion

The maximum absolute stress,
, in an infinite plate with an elliptical hole
subjected to uniaxial tension perpendicular to the major axis is given by
and is the 22-component at the end of the major axis of the
ellipse (point M in Figure 1.17.22). The contour of
in the vicinity of the hole is
shown in Figure 1.17.23 (shaded elements in Figure 1.17.21). The finite element
model gives a maximum stress of 299.3 units, which is close to the expected value of
300 units.
The sensitivity of
at M with respect to a is given by
. The value
of
obtained from Abaqus/Design is 19.99 units and compares well with the
analytical result of 20 units. Figure 1.17.24 shows the contours of
near the
hole. As expected,
is most sensitive to the variation in the semi-major axis at points
nearest to the region of stress concentration. The value of
in the perturbation
step is 9.995 units, exactly half the value in the linear static step as expected.

Input file
dsastressconcsens.inp
Quarter plate model using CPS4 elements.

Figures
Figure 1.17.21 Quarter model using CPS4 elements.

Figure 1.17.22 Mesh details near the hole.

Figure 1.17.23 Variation of

near the circular hole.

Figure 1.17.24 The variation of the sensitivity

near the circular hole.