Finite Element Approximation of a Geometrically Exact Shell Model
Abstract
The purpose of this work is to develop finite element models for geometrically exact nonlinear shells. The originality of our approach is to work in a fixed cartesian basis. After a brief introduction of the shell model, the paper presents two finite elements approximations specially developed for this problem. The first uses conforming Argyris triangles, the second develops nonlinear DKT triangles. Both models are validated by several numerical tests.