Development of a varying mesh scheme for finite element crack closure analysis

•A varying mesh scheme is proposed to save computation time.•Remeshing and variable mapping are required additional works for the scheme.•Good variable mapping is necessary for good calculated crack opening results.•A large amount of computation time can be saved using the new scheme.

Large amount of computation time is inevitable for finite element crack closure analysis when the crack propagates a long distance. This is because numerous elements are needed along the crack path. A method using a varying mesh technique is proposed to reduce the number of elements. In the method, a new finite element model is constructed before crack tip release, thus, compared to the conventional scheme, two additional tasks are required for the new approach: remeshing and state variable mapping. The proposed technique using a simple variable mapping produces unacceptable results for the plane strain condition. Investigations show that the residual nodal forces resulted from the mapped stresses cause the difficulty. A new remeshing method is proposed to overcome the difficulty. Also, significant computation time saving by the new technique is confirmed.

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