3. Modeling A

3.1. Characteristics of modeling

The simplex method is used by PROPA_FISS.

3.2. Characteristics of the mesh

The structure is modelled by a mesh composed of 2040 elements HEXA8 (see).

Figure 3.2-a: structure mesh

The mesh is very coarse to reduce the calculation time. Slightly smaller elements are used in the crack propagation zone. The dimension of the elements is \(0.17\times 0.33\times 0.2m\) in this area. The largest element used has a dimension equal to \(0.17\times 0.8\times 1.6m\).

3.3. Tested sizes and results

We extract the normal (\(\mathrm{LSN}\)) and tangent (\(\mathrm{LST}\)) level set using the POST_RELEVE_T operator using the operator and we check that the maximum and minimum values remain within the radius of capture of the nodes tested around the crack front, i.e. 1/3:

\(\mathrm{Propag.}i\)	\(\mathrm{Max}{\mathrm{LSN}}_{i}\)	\(\mathrm{Min}{\mathrm{LSN}}_{i}\)		\(\mathrm{Max}{\mathrm{LST}}_{i}\)	\(\mathrm{Min}{\mathrm{LST}}_{i}\)
3	0.2	0.2	0.2	0.267	0.267

The results obtained clearly show that the level-sets remain less than the radius in which the crack front was located. This means that the crack bottom has been correctly located by the simplex method.