Bearings with clearance

[1081]

Dear @smith120bh, I want to express my gratitude for your contributions to anaStruct. Thank you very much for the excellent work!"

I use anaStruct for many years. At the moment I to calculate the bending line of turbine shafts. Here is a simple example of a shaft with three bearings as spring supports and one force:

Would it be somehow possible to specify a "bearing clearance" (as a fixed gap) for the spring supports? This would ensure the bearing comes into play only when the gap is completely closed."

[brookshsmith]

Hi @1081 -
Thanks for the suggestion! Unfortunately, what you're discussing there can only be done in an iterative, inelastic FEA solve, and anaStruct is currently a static, elastic solve only. I'd like to at some point add some iterative functionality to anaStruct, though my first target would be merely a direct P-Δ analysis, which is iterative but still elastic. Inelastic analyses get notably harder, as you need to change the member stiffness conditionally based upon deflections.

That is to say, maybe someday, but I'm not sure I personally at least want to build out anaStruct that far.