Viscoelasticity

5.2 Generalized Nonlinear Elastic Formulation

In the previous Section, the assumption of linearity was made on the elastic stress-strain response. In this Section, this
assumption will be modified in order to enable more general hyperelastic models to be utilised. This can be achieved by recasting
the formulation of the previous Section in such a way that the notion of strain energy function is introduced in the formulation.
Then any suitable strain energy function can be utilised to express a linear or nonlinear elastic stress-strain response.
The elastic stored energy in the springs associated with the model of Fig. 5.2 is
5.21
or in a notation more appropriate for latter developments in Chapter 6
5.22
Then, the derivative with respect to strain is

5.23
in which 5.24
And 5.25
From a comparison of Eq. 5.9 and Eq. 5.23 it can be concluded that
5.26
 Viscoelasticity
If a new energy function is defined as
5.27
And 5.28
then Eq. 5.9 and Eq. 5.11 can be expressed as
5.29

The solution of Eq. 5.29 is (Appendix 5.2)

5.30
Summing over N

5.31
However, in view of Eq. 5.28 it is valid
5.32
 Viscoelasticity
Substituting in Eq. 5.31

5.33
and hence from Eq. 5.29
5.34
In order to obtain an expression convenient for numerical implementation, the stress at the current time step can be rewritten as
5.35
By means of the same procedure as in Section 5.1.2 the following recursive formula is obtained for computation of

; ; 5.36
;
 Viscoelasticity
5.4.1 Elementary Model
A schematic of the elementary generalized Burger’s model is shown in Fig. 5.3. In this type of model the stress is transmitted
through each element and the strains are additive so that
5.43
where , ,, and are the total, elastic, viscoelastic and viscoplastic strain components.

The strain in the elastic component when a stress is applied to the mechanical device of Fig. 5.3 can be readily calculated as
5.44
in which is the modulus of elasticity.
On the basis of the observations made in Section 5.1, the stress in the viscoelastic component can be computed from
5.45
Setting 5.46
 Viscoelasticity
which can be solved by means of a Laplace transform (Appendix 5.3) to obtain
5.47
Finally, the strain increment corresponding to a stress increment is (Appendix 5.3)

5.48
with 5.49
The response of the viscoplastic component is described by
5.50
which can be solved by means of a Laplace transform (Appendix 5.4) to obtain
5.51
in which 5.52
Finally, the strain increment corresponding to a stress increment is

5.53