Scientific Technical Review,Vol.LVIII,No.

3-4,2008 1
UDK: 621.01:539.3/.4
COSATI: 20-12

Contact Problems Based on the Penalty Method

Snežana Vulović (Eng)1)

Miroslav Živković, (Eng)2)
Nenad Grujović, (Eng)2)

In this paper the contact problems including frictional effects are presented. Contact between two deformable bodies
is considered in general. The present approach, based on the Coulomb’s frictional law, elastic-plastic tangential slip
decomposition and consistent linearization results in quadratic rates of convergence with the help of the Newton-
Raphson iterative solution scheme. The results for the verification example are also presented.

Key words: contact problem, contact strain, friction, finite elements, penalty method, nonlinear analysis.

Introduction x k − x (ξ 1 , ξ 2 )
⋅ aα (ξ 1 , ξ 2 ) = 0 (1)
N UMERICAL analysis of frictional contact problems
has been one of the research topics of main interest in
recent years [1], [2], [3], [4]. Frictional contact problems
x k − x (ξ 1 , ξ 2 )

where α = 1, 2 and aα (ξ 1 , ξ 2 ) are the tangent covariant

arise in many application fields such as metal forming
processes, the impact of cars, etc. base vectors at the point x . The normal gap or the
The effective application of finite element contact penetration g N for the slave node k is defined as the
solutions needs a high degree of experience since the distance between the current positions of this node to the
general robustness and stability cannot be guaranteed. For master surface ΓC(2) :
this reason the development of more efficient, fast and
stable finite element contact discretizations is still a hot g N = (xk − x ) ⋅ n (2)
topic, especially due to the fact that engineering
applications are becoming more and more complex.
where n refers to the normal to the master surface ΓC(2) at
In this paper, a framework for contact problems with
friction is developed based on the penalty method. The penalty point x (Fig.1). The normal will be defined using the
formulation has the advantage for being purely geometrically tangent vectors at the point x
based and therefore no additional degrees of freedom have to a1 × a2
be activated or inactivated. A numerical example is shown to n= (3)
demonstrate that the presented algorithm can be successfully a1 × a2
applied to contact problems [6].

Contact kinematics
As the configurations of two bodies coming into the
contact are not a priori known, contact represents a
nonlinear problem even when the continuum behaves as a
linear elastic material.
Using a standard notation in contact mechanics, for each
pair of contact surfaces, involved in the problem, we will
define slave ( ΓC(1) ) and master surfaces ( ΓC(2) ) , Fig.1. The
condition, which must be satisfied, is that any slave particle
cannot penetrate the master surface.
Let x be the projection point of the current position of
Figure 1. Geometry of the 3D node-to-segment contact element
the slave node x k onto the current position of the master
This gap (2) gives the non-penetration conditions as
surface ΓC(2) , defined as
follows:

1)
Faculty of Information Technology, 11000 Belgrade, SERBIA
2)
Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Sestre Janjić 6, 34000 Kragujevaca, SERBIA
2 VULOVIĆ.S., ŽIVKOVIĆ.M., GRUJOVIĆ.N.: CONTACT PROBLEMS BASED ON THE PENALTY METHOD

g N = 0 perfect contact; α = ε T gT α
tTstick (12)
g N > 0 no contact; (4)
g N < 0 penetration where ε T is the tangential penalty parameter.
A relative movement between two bodies occurs if the
If the analyzed problem is frictionless, function (4) static friction resistance is overcome and the loading is
completely defines the contact kinematics. However, if large enough so that the sliding process can be kept. The
friction is modeled, tangential relative displacement must tangential stress vector is restricted as follows:
be introduced. In that case, the sliding path of the node x k
gTslα
over the contact surface ΓC(2) is described by total tTslα = − μ t N (13)
tangential relative displacement as g Tsl
t t t where μ is the friction coefficient. In the simplest form of
∫ ∫ξ ∫
α α  β
gT = g T dt = aα dt = ξ ξ aαβ dt (5) Coulomb’s law (13), μ is constant so there is no difference
t0 t0 t0 between static and sliding friction.
After the introduction of the rod and slip constraints, we
in the time interval from t0 to t.
need to introduce an indicator to define whether rod or slip
The time derivatives of the parameter ξ α in actually takes place. Therefore an indicator function
equation (5) can be computed from (1), [4]. We obtain the
following result: f = tT -μ t N (14)

 is evaluated, which respects the Coulomb’s model for the

aβα ξ β = ⎡⎣ x k − x ⎤⎦ ⋅ aα = gTα (6)
frictional interface law. In equation (14) the first term is
where aαβ = aα ⋅ aβ is the metric tensor in the point x of tT = tTα a αβ tT β .
the master surface ΓC(2) . From equations (5) and (6) we can A backward Euler integration scheme and a return
mapping strategy are used to integrate the friction equations
express the relative tangential velocity at the contact point
(14), [1]. If a state of rod is assumed, the trial values of the
 tangential contact pressure vector tTα , and the indicator
g T = ξ α aα = gTα aα (7)
function f at load step n+1 can be expressed in terms of
their values at the load step n as follows
Constitutive equations for contact interface β
α n +1 = tTα n + ε T ΔgTα n+1 = tTα n + ε T aαβ Δξ n +1
tTtrial (15)
A contact stress vector t with respect to the current
contact interface ΓC(2) can be split into a normal and
+1 = tTn+1 − μ t Nn+1
fTntrial trial
(16)
tangential part.
t = tN + tT = tN n + tTα aα (8) The return mapping is completed by

where aα is the contravariant base vector. The stress acts ⎧t trial if f ≤ 0

tTα n+1 = ⎨ Tα n+1 trial (17)
on both surfaces according to the action-reaction principle: ⎩ μ t Nn+1 nTα n+1 if f > 0
t (ξ 1 , ξ 2 ) = −t in the contact point x . The tangential stress with
tTα is zero in the case of frictionless contact. In the case of
tTtrial
α n+1
contact there is the condition tN < 0 . If there is no nTtrial
α n+1 = trial
(18)
tTn +1
penetration between the bodies, then relations g N > 0 and
tN = 0 are satisfied. This leads to the statements For both cases, the penalty method can be illustrated as a
group of linear elastic springs that force the body back to
g N ≥ 0, tN ≤ 0, tN g N = 0 (9) the contact surface when overlapping or sliding occurs.
which are known as Kuhn-Tucker conditions. Using the
penalty method for normal stress, constitutive equation can Algorithm for frictional contact
be formulated as For solving a nonlinear equilibrium equation with
tN = ε N g N (10) inequality constraints (4) as a result of contact, we use a
standard implicit method. In order to apply Newton’s
where ε N is the normal penalty parameter. method for the solution system of equilibrium equation, a
In the tangential direction there is a difference between linearization of the contact contributions is necessary. In
the rod and the slip. As long as no sliding between two this paper, we do not state the linearization procedure for
bodies occurs, the tangential relative velocity is zero. If the the standard finite element formulation as well as the
velocity is zero, also the tangential relative displacement (5) contact interface law for the normal and tangential part. It
is zero. This state is called a rod case with the following could be found in [7], [8].
restriction: The tangent stiffness matrix for the normal contact is
g T = 0 ⇔ gT = 0 (11) K N = ε N NNT (19)
For the rod a simple linear constitutive model can be The symmetric tangent stiffness matrix for the rod
used to describe the tangential stress. condition is
 VULOVIĆ.S., ŽIVKOVIĆ.M., GRUJOVIĆ.N.: CONTACT PROBLEMS BASED ON THE PENALTY METHOD 3

BAR 1 BAR 2
K Tstick = ε T aαβ Dα Dβ T (20) Model 10 elements 40 elements
Young's Modulus E =100000 E =6250
where Poisson's ratio
1
ν =0
2
ν =0
1 2

⎧ aβ ⎫ Density ρ =4 ρ =4
⎧ n ⎫ 1 2
⎪ − H1n ⎪ ⎪ − H1 aβ ⎪ Cross-section A =1 A =1
⎪ ⎪ ⎪ ⎪
1 2
α αβ
N = ⎨− H 2n ⎬ Tβ = ⎨− H 2 aβ ⎬ D = a Tβ . (21) Length L =10
1
L =10
2

⎪ − H 3n ⎪ ⎪ − H 3 aβ ⎪ Initial velocity v =5
1
v =0
2
⎪− H n ⎪ ⎪− H a ⎪
⎩ 4 ⎭ ⎩ 4 β⎭

The linearization of nTtrial

α n+1 gives (for details see [1])

⎛ t trial ⎞
Δ ( nTtrial
α n+1 ) = Δ ⎜ trial ⎟ =
T α n+1
⎜ tTn+1 ⎟
⎝ ⎠ (22)
1 β trial β
= trial ⎡⎣δα − nTα n+1nT n+1 ⎤⎦ ΔtT β n+1
trial trial
tTn+1 Figure 2. Rod impact model made of different elastic materials

The difference in the element numbers comes from the

The tangent stiffness matrix for the slip condition is references for the problem modeling where wave effects
α T appear. The ratio of modules E1 E2 = 16 , according to the
K Tslip = με N nTtrial
α n+1D N +
(23) equation of stress wave velocity in rods
με N g Nn+1 trial β cEi = Ei / ρi i=1,2 (a)
+ trial
ε T aβγ ⎡⎣δαβ − nTtrial
α n+1nT n +1 ⎤
α γT
⎦D D
tTn +1
results in the fact that the other rod has to have four times
The second term, the tangent matrix is non-symmetric shorter elements with the chosen time quantity. This way it
and due to the Coulomb’s friction can be viewed as a non- is possible for the stress wave not to pass more than one
associative constitutive equation. element in both rods, in the time increment the boundary
The frictional contact algorithm based on the penalty value of which is:
method is shown in Table 1.
( L1 /10) ( L2 / 40)
Δtcr = = = 0.006324 (b)
Table 1. Frictional contact algorithm based on the penalty method cE1 cE 2
LOOP over all contact segment k
The obtained results with ε N = 1011 are completely the
(check for contact (6)) IF g N ≤ 0 THEN
same in both cases (2D and 3D) and they perfectly match
(the first iteration) IF i=1 THEN the results obtained by Lagrange’s method [5], and the
set all active nodes to state rod, analytical results).
tTn+1 (18), compute matrix K Tstick 700
ELSE Lagrange Penalty
600
tTtrial
α n +1 fTntrial
+1
Compute trial state: (19) and (20) 500
Contact force

IF fTntrial
+1 ≤ 0 THEN 400

tT α n +1 = tTtrial
α n +1 K Tstick 300
, compute matrix (40)
GO TO (a) 200
ELSE 100
tTα n +1 = μ t Nn+1 nTtrial slip
α n +1
, compute matrix K T (43) 0
ENDIF 0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7
Time
ENDIF
ENDIF Figure 3. Contact force time histories
(a) END LOOP
Figures 3 - 7 are graphic reviews of time depending on
force, displacement, velocity and acceleration of rod points
Example 1 and 2 in the contact. For the sake of clarity, the
acceleration diagram is show separately for each section.
This example offers a specific verification of the contact
The result is obtained by the approximately explicit
algorithm in dynamic analysis conditions, considering the
dynamic compatibility for specific elements. The point is in integration (α=0.001001, β=0.502) with the time increment
a geometrically quite simple problem, for which there is an Δt = Δtcr . The whole calculation is done in 100 time
analytical solution. increments and quantities on diagrams are shown for each
Rods are modeled by 2D (plane stress) and 3D elements. increment. It is seen from the diagram that a better result
The following geometrical (Fig.2) and material data are stability is obtained by the penalty method, which is quite
presented (without units as in [5]): obvious from the acceleration diagram.
 4 VULOVIĆ.S., ŽIVKOVIĆ.M., GRUJOVIĆ.N.: CONTACT PROBLEMS BASED ON THE PENALTY METHOD

2,2 2500 Lagrange2 Penalty2

Lagrange1 Penalty1 Lagrange2 Penalty2
2 2000
1,8 1500
1,6
1000
1,4

Accelerations
Displacement

500
1,2
0
1
-500 0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7
0,8
-1000
0,6
0,4 -1500

0,2 -2000
0 -2500
0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7 Time
Time
Figure 7. Acceleration time histories, cross-section 2
Figure 4. Displacement time histories

9 Lagrange1 Penalty1 Lagrange2 Penalty2 Conclusions

8 A model for 3D contact problem based on the penalty
7 method was proposed. Due to the intrinsic similarity
6 between friction and the classical elastic-plasticity [7], the
constitutive model for friction can be constructed following
Velocity

5
the same formalism as in classical elastic-plasticity. The
4
numerical example indicates a possibility of applying the
3
developed method in the analysis of dynamic problems.
2
1 References
0
0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7 [1] LAURSEN,T.A., SIMO,J.C.: A continuum-based finite element
Time formulation for the implicit solution of multibody, large deformation
frictional contact problems, Inter. J. Num. Meth. Eng. 36 3451-3485,
1993.
Figure 5. Velocity time histories
[2] FISHER,K.A.: Mortal type methods applied to nonlinear contact
mechanics, Ph.D. Thesis, Institut für Bumechanick und Numerische
2500
Mechanik Univ. of Hannover, Hannover, 2005.
Lagrange1 Penalty1
2000 [3] WRIGGERS,P., VAN,T.V., STEIN,E.: Finite element formulation of
large deformation impact-contact problems with friction, Computers
1500
and Structures. 37 319-333, 1990.
1000
[4] WRIGGERS,P.: Computational Contact Mechanics, J. Wiley & Sons
Accelerations

500 Ltd, West Sussex, England, 2002.

0 [5] GRUJOVIĆ,N.: Contact problem solution by finite element methods,
-500 0 0,1 0,2 0,3 0,4 0,5 0,6 0,7 Ph.D. Thesis, Faculty of Mech. Eng. Univ. of Kragujevac,
-1000 Kragujevac, 1996.
-1500 [6] KOJIĆ,M., SLAVKOVIĆ,R., ŽIVKOVIĆ,M., GRUJOVIĆN.: The
software packages PAK, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of
-2000
Kragujevac, Serbia.
-2500
[7] KOJIĆ,M., BATHE,K.J.: Inelastic Analysis of Solids and Structures,
Time Springer, Berlin-Heidelberg, 2005.
[8] ŽIVKOVIĆ,M.: Nonlinear structural analysis, Monograph, Faculty of
Figure 6. Acceleration time histories, cross-section 1 Mech. Eng. Univ. of Kragujevac, Kragujevac, Serbia, 2006.

Received: 01.11.2008.

Kontaktni problemi zasnovani na Penalty metodi

U radu su prikazani kontaktni problemi sa trenjem. Razmatran je kontakt između dva deformabilna tela u opštem
slučaju. Prikazan prilaz, zasnovan na Kolumbovom zakonu trenja, dekompoziciji kontaktnog napona po analogiji sa
elasto-plastičnom dekompozicijom i odgovarajućom linearizacijom rezultira kvadratnom konvergencijom rešenja
primenom Njutn-Rapsonove iterativne metode. Na kraju rada su data rešenja za verifikacioni primer.

Ključne reči: kontaktni problem, kontaktno naprezanje, trenje, konačni element, Panalty metoda, nelinearna analiza.
 VULOVIĆ.S., ŽIVKOVIĆ.M., GRUJOVIĆ.N.: CONTACT PROBLEMS BASED ON THE PENALTY METHOD 5

Kontaktnwe problemw obosnovanw na PENALTY-metodu

V nasto}|ej rabote pokazanw kontaktnwe problemw s treniem, a rassmatrivan kontakt me`du dvum}
deformirovannwmi telami v ob|em obsto}telxstve. To`e pokazan podhod, obosnovan na zakone treni}
Kolumba, na razlo`enii kontaktnogo napr}`eni} po shodstvu s uprugo-plasti~eskim razlo`eniem i
sootvetstvuy|ej linejnostxy, kotorwj proishodit v rezulxtate kvadratnoj shodimosti (konvergencii)
re{eni} s primeneniem povtor}y|egos} metoda Nxytn-Rapsona. V samom konce rabotw privedenw
re{eni} dl} primera proverki.

Kly~evwe slova: kontaktna} problemma, kontaktnoe napr}`enie, trenie, kone~nwj &lement, PENALTY-
metod, nelinejnwj analiz.

Problèmes de contact basés sur la méthode PENALTY

Dans ce travail on a présenté les problèmes de contact concernant les effets de friction. On a considéré le contact entre
deux corps déformables dans le cas général. L’approche présentée, basée sur la loi de friction selon Coulomb, la
décomposition de la tension de contact d’après l’analogie avec la décomposition élastique plastique et la linéarisation
correspondante, a pour résultat la convergence carrée de la solution par l’application de la méthode Raphson-
Newton. A la fin de ce travail, on a donné les solutions de l’exemple de vérification.

Mots clés: problème de contact, contrainte de contact, friction, élément fini, méthode Penalty, analyse non linéaire.