Adaptive Boundary Elements for Thermoelastic Analysis

Abstract

The previously developed adaptive boundary element h-refinement scheme called "sample point error analysis and related refinement by extended error indicator" is applied to linear thermoelastic analysis. The problem is expressed by two types of boundary integral equations : one for temperature and the other for displacement components, which yield two solution inconsistencies for each sample point. Approximate adaptive iteration schemes to overcome the difficulty and to give sufficiently accurate results are presented. Two-dimensional elastic bodies subjected to thermal as well as external loads are analyzed by the proposed methods. The adaptive boundary element analysis can be performed by specifying minimum information required for defining the problem considered ; the scheme is user-friendly.