ON SOLVING NEARLY INCOMPRESSIBLE 2D PROBLEMS USING AN ADAPTIVE REFINEMENT PROCEDURE

A numerical study is carried out employing some selected 2D elements a nd an automatic adaptive refinement procedure for the solution of a pr oblem involving a nearly incompressible material. For a material with Poisson's ratio close to 0.5, it is found that both hybrid elements an d high-order Lagrangian triangles can be used to provide a reliable so lution. Furthermore, the rate of convergence of the elements is not af fected by the high value of Poisson's ratio, and a near-optimal conver gence rate is achieved in all the numerical tests run. (C) 1998 John W iley & Sons, Ltd.