Direct Simulation of Engineering Problems with a Fast Array Computer : 2nd Report, Parallel Computation Algorithms using SOR Method

Abstract

The finite difference or finite element method, which has been applied successfully to the numerical analyses of many engineering problems, consists of synthesizing linear equations for nodal points of mesh of continuous solids and solving these simultaneous linear equations by a proper algorithm using a conventional computer, which has one or a few arithmetic units (AU). If an array computer is designed, which has hundreds of AUs connected in a network fashion, the time-consuming finite difference or finite element computations can be executed very fast, provided each AU is attached to each nodal point and parallel computations are performed at each AU according to common timing diagrams. This report deals with the development of parallel computation algorithm using SOR method and discusses the computation efficiencies, aiming at the development of array computer which can be used profitably to solve many engineering problems.