Plate Attributes: Stiffness/Mass Factor

Description

Assigns stiffness and mass scaling factors to selected plate elements.

These factors scale the stiffness and mass of an element, without modifying the property set.

Stiffness factors apply only to isotropic material; they are not applicable to orthotropic, anisotropic, user-defined, laminate, nonlinear rubber, soil or fluid materials. The way the factors scale the stiffness matrix is summarised in Plate Elements: Stiffness Factors.

Mass factor applies to all material types.

Plate stiffness and mass factor attributes are independent of load and freedom cases.

Dialog

Factors - stiffness terms

Each of the following represents a component in the element stiffness matrix, and each one can be scaled independently. Not all components apply to all the plate types (for example, the components relating to the bending stiffness do not apply to plane stress, plane strain or 3D membrane elements).

Cxx

Membrane stiffness in the local x direction - applies to all plate types.
Cyy

Membrane stiffness in the local y direction - applies to all plate types.
Cgg

Membrane stiffness in-plane shear - applies to all plate types.
Czz

Normal stiffness - applies to plane strain and axisymmetric plates.
Dxx

Bending stiffness in the local x direction - applies to shell types.
Dyy

Bending stiffness in the local y direction - applies to shell types.
Dgg

Bending stiffness in the local twist direction - applies to shell types.
Gxz

Transverse shear stiffness normal to the local x direction - applies to thick shell types.
Gyz

Transverse shear stiffness normal to the local y direction - applies to thick shell types.

Factors - mass term

Mass

Factor that scales the mass density - applies to all plate types.

Common Controls

Units

All factors are dimensionless.