As a first step to a larger study, I am trying to do a simple FEA of a point contact between two spheres in contact using Pro/E Mechanica (version 4.0 I believe). I cannot get it to run. I do have some experience running FEA on single parts, but not assemblies. I am simply trying to force two spheres together (point contact) and observe the deflection (i.e. mutual attraction) of the two bodies for a given force. I don't have it in front of me right now, but I remember it was saying there was no interface defined (or something to that effect); I tried defining an interface and it didn't seem to fix it. Any help on how I can do this problem would be very greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

It's been a couple of years since I have worked with FEA, but the following may help.

-make sure each part is meshed separately, and not over lapping (but close together)

-define the elements on the surface of contact as gap elements.

 

Thanks for the response, this problem is very important for me.

-How do I mesh parts separately? The parts are just touching, I have also tried two sets of constraints to be sure. One set was purely numerical (space parts XXX, inches apart), the second was a point (the contact point, that is) on surface constraint.

-I am still fairly new to FEA, what do you mean by, and how do I go about, defining the elements on the surface of contact as gap elements?

Thanks