A new Timoshenko beam model for simulation of mechanical system with large deformation

Beam model has been used widely in computer aided engineering for mechanical systems and the simulation results largely depend on the beam model, there are great demand for beam model with high accuracy and efficiency in simulating the mechanical system with large deformation. In this work, a new model of Timoshenko beam for large deformations is proposed to improve the accuracy and efficiency. Absolute nodal coordinate formulation and geometrically-exact beam formulation, which make the model very suitable to simulate large deformation mechanical system, are first combined in the new beam model, the governing equations are then discrete by finite element methods and numerical difficulties are well solved by applying the shape function strategy. The new beam model is then applied to simulate the mechanical systems with large deformation and the simulations based on the traditional beam model and hexahedron element were also carried out to verify the results. The results show that good precision and efficiency in simulating the mechanical systems with large deformation can be obtained by the new Timoshenko beam model at the same time. The presented new method also serves as a good foundation for other simulation of mechanical systems.