Adaptive mesh-updating methods for non-linear finite element analysis of shells

We consider methods for adaptive updating of computational meshes during in cremental loading of non-linear shell and solid structures. In particular, we focus on updating methods where the initial topology of the mesh is main tained. The movement of the mesh (the convective step) is decoupled from th e Lagrangian solution step and is done by using separately computed displac ement fields, obtained by solving auxiliary thermoelastic problems. The pro perties of this mesh-updating procedure are investigated and demonstrated o n several examples. (C) 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.