Topology optimization of structures: A minimum weight approach with stress constraints

In this paper, we analyze and compare both approaches, and we present a FEM minimum weight with stress constraints (MWSC) formulation for topology structural optimization problems. This approach does not require any stabilization technique to produce acceptable optimized results, while no truss-like final solutions are necessarily obtained. Several 2D examples are presented. The optimized solutions seem to be correct from the engineering point of view, and their appearence could be considered closer to the engineering intuition than the traditional truss-like results obtained by means of the widespread maximum stiffness (minimum compliance) approaches.