A tool for post-processing of isogeometric laminated structures models

Resumo

Composite materials are made by the union of multiple materials, aiming to obtain a material with superior properties compared to its components. A laminated structure is formed from the stacking of composite layers, e.g. in fiber-reinforced composites. The most used numerical method for the structural analysis of composite structures is the Finite Element Method (FEM). Isogeometric Analysis (IGA) is an alternative method that uses the same mathematical functions as the CAD systems (e.g., B-Splines and NURBS) to describe both the geometry and the displacements of the solid. This eliminates the geometry approximation error inherent in the polynomial functions of the FEM. Despite its numerical accuracy, IGA is a recent method and lacks pre-processing and post-processing tools. The FAST (Finite element AnalySis Tool) is a numerical simulator that implements both methods, developed at the Universidade Federal do Ceará. The software outputs an analysis results file containing information about the analyzed structure model and the simulation responses (i.e., displacements and internal forces of the structure). This work presents a post-processing tool to visualize the output analysis files generated by FAST, especially for isogeometric laminated plates and shells modeled using rational Bézier elements and NURBS. The code is written in Python, using the Matplotlib library for rendering and the PyQt6 library to implement a graphical user interface that allows for the intuitive and efficient manipulation of visualization data. The developed software features are demonstrated through several examples of laminated composite material plates and shells analyzed by FAST, where the distribution of stresses and displacements of the structure is drawn using an appropriate contour color map. Moreover, it was possible to visualize the stress distribution along the thickness of the laminate.