A two-step, two-field hybrid method for the static and dynamic analysis of substructure problems with conforming and non-conforming interfaces Original Research Article

The need for assembling independent finite element substructure solutions arises in several engineering and scientific problems including the design and analysis of complex structural systems, component mode synthesis, global/local analysis, adaptive refinement and parallel processing. In this paper, we discuss the solution of such problems by a two-field hybrid method where the substructures are jointed with low-order polynomial or piece-wise polynomial Lagrange multipliers and present a Rayleigh-Ritz based smoothing procedure for improving the accuracy of the computed coupled solution in the presence of various substructure heterogeneities. We consider both conforming and nonconforming substructure meshes, and demonstrate the benefits of the proposed two-step solution method with several examples from structural mechanics.