Workshop 5

Conducting a Spotweld Failure

Analysis 14.5 Release

ANSYS LS-DYNA
in Mechanical APDL
© 2012 ANSYS, Inc. February 5, 2013 1 Release 14.5
 Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis

• This workshop demonstrates how to define a massless spotweld. Two

overlapping steel plates are connected together with a single weld. Due to the
hourglassing implications of the single attachment point, fully integrated
SHELL163 elements are used. One plate is held at its base, while the other plate
is pulled away from it, creating a tensile load. Both shear and normal forces
develop as the plates stretch and bend under the applied load. When the brittle
failure conditions are met, the spotweld breaks apart. The required input file is
spot.inp
• Step-by-step instructions are shown on the following slides. Your instructor will
give those details particular to your site.
• spot.inp is fully commented. A /EOF command stops the input stream after the
majority of the model is created, allowing you to complete the exercise yourself.
The GUI generated commands appear after the /EOF command, so you can
compare them to your .LOG file, if you experience any problems.

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Start ANSYS/Multiphysics/LS-DYNA in the GUI mode

• Read in the input file “ spot.inp ”

Utility Menu > File > Read input from … > spot.inp > OK
OR issue:
/input, spot.inp

• Fully-integrated SHELL163 elements are used, so

additional hourglass control is not needed.

• A BKIN material model is defined for both plates.

(Review the properties in the GUI, if desired.)

• The bottom plate is completely fixed at its base.

The top edge of the top plate is only free in the
UY DOF, allowing it to be pulled upward.

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Define a massless spotweld between the two plates:
Preprocessor > LS-DYNA Options > Spotweld > Massless Spotwld

• Pick the two nodes at the centers of the

overlapping sections and then select OK.

• These will most likely be nodes 78 and 37

in your model, but may vary.

• Scalar parameters (N1 and N2) have

already been created for the appropriate
nodes (i.e., at the desired locations). You
can list these parameters to identify the
correct nodes for the weld definition:
Utility Menu > Parameters > Scalar Parameters …
OR issue:
*status, parm

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Now complete the spotweld definition. First enter the normal force (Sn) and shear
force (Ss) allowables of 100 kN each. Next, enter the normal and shear force
exponents (expn and exps) of 2 for the equation:

expn exps •
 | fn |   | fs | 
When the fn and fs values satisfy
     1 this equation, the weld will fail.
Only a tensile force is considered
 sn   ss  for the normal direction.

• Enter the spotweld

reference number 1

• You can enter the

scalar parameters N1
and N2 instead of the
node numbers 78 and
37, respectively.
OK

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• The previous GUI selections are equivalent to the batch commands:
/prep7
edweld, add, 1,78,37, 100,100,2,2 (or edweld, add, 1,N1,N2, 100,100,2,2)

• Now it is time to define the displacement load applied to the top edge of the top
plate in the +Y direction. To save time, some prerequisite steps have already been
done for you. The explicit time (etime) and displacement (ydisp) arrays have been
defined, along with the nodal component (npull) that the displacement load is
applied to.

• First create a data curve of the UY displacement versus explicit time:

Solution > Loading Options > Curve Options > Add Curve

• Specify the data curve

ID to be 1 and select
the appropriate arrays,
as shown.
OK
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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
OR issue:
/solu
edcurve, add, 1, etime, ydisp
• Now plot the data curve to be sure that it is correctly defined:
Solution > Loading Options > Curve Options > Plot Curve > 1 > OK
OR issue:
edcurve, plot, 1
• The displacement ramps up from 0 mm at
TIME=0 to 40 mm at TIME=1.01 ms. The
ending time is a little past the termination
time (1 ms) so that the structure does not
instantly unload at the end of the run.

• You cannot extend load curves during a

simple or small restart, although some
changes are allowed in a full restart.
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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Now associate this data curve with the desired nodal component:
Solution > Loading Options > Specify Loads > Add Loads > UY >
0 > NPULL > None > None > Transient only > 1 > OK
OR issue:
edload, add, uy, 0, npull, , , , 1

• Note: The data curve could have been

created at the same time the load was
associated with the nodal component,
but using an existing data curve is
often advantageous when the same
curve is applied to multiple parts or
when a trade study is conducted on
the effect of a given load. In the latter
scenario, the ordinate values (in this
case, the displacements) could be
easily scaled without redefining the
OK displacement versus time curve.

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis

• Now plot the completely defined load curve:

Solution > Loading Options > Plot Load Curve > 1 > OK
OR issue:
edpl, 1

• The EDPL command is plotting the load

curve, which associates the UY versus
time data curve (CID) with the nodal
component. Note that LS-DYNA also
refers to data curves as load curves.
This naming terminology is confusing,
so we list the data curve as CID in the
EDLOAD, LIST output:

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Now save the model and solve it:
ANSYS Toolbar > SAVE_DB
Solution > Solve > OK
OR issue:
save
solve
• When the solution is done, enter POST1 and animate the results:
General Postproc > Read Results > Last Set
General Postproc > Plot Results > Contour Plot > Nodal Solu >
Stress > von Mises SEQV > OK (or whatever else you wish to animate)
Utility Menu > PlotCtrls > Animate > Over Time … > Stress >
von Mises SEQV > OK
Select “Forward Only” on the Animation Controller, if desired ...

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
OR issue:
/post1
set, last
plnsol, s, eqv
antime, 10, 0.5, ,1

• Close the animation

before continuing on.
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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Finally, switch over to POST26 (Time History postprocessor) and check some of the
global statistic data stored on the glstat file:
TimeHist Postpro

• The Variable Viewer will come up automatically, but the active results file will be
spot.rst, instead of spot.his, since the former was used in POST1 already. Although
both results files can be used in POST26, the latter usually contains data saved more
frequently. Further, the ASCII output files processed by the EDREAD command (e.g.,
the glstat file) actually use the time values stored on the Jobname.HIS file.

POST26 Variable Viewer

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Switch over from the Jobname.RST file to the Jobname.HIS file:
File > Open Results … > Files of type: Explicit Dynamics Results (*.his) >
spot.his > Open > spot.db > Open

6
7
4

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Continue with the mouse picks shown below:
8 5
7

1
2
3

• Use Ctrl key for

6 multiple picks

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
OR issue:
/post26
numvar, 200
file, spot, his
edread, 2, glstat
store, merge
plvar, 3, 4, 7, 8, 11, 17

• Note that the hourglass

energy is zero, due to
the fully-integrated shell
elements.

• If time permits, review the displacement history of the spotweld nodes,

N1 and N2 (i.e., most likely nodes 78 and 37). This data is available on
the time history results file (spot.his) because a nodal component was
specified via the EDHIST command in the input file spot.inp

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• You can just use the scalar parameters N1 and N2 to get the UY data:
TimeHist Postpro > Variable Viewer … > (See picks below) :

9
1

Pick node 78, type it in,

8
5 6 or type in N1 – followed
7
by a carriage return …

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 … Conducting a Spotweld Failure Analysis
• Follow the same exact GUI procedure to plot UY of N2 (node 37) …
OR issue:
nsol, 18, 78, u, y, uy_18
nsol, 19, 37, u, y, uy_19
plvar, 18, 19 ! overlay plots

• The time history results file (.HIS)

allows much more frequent data
storage for a small subset of the
model. From the graph, the weld
failure point is obvious.

• When done, exit ANSYS:

ANSYS Toolbar > Quit > OK

OR issue:
/eof

© 2012 ANSYS, Inc. February 5, 2013 17 Release 14.5