AUTOMATIC NODE REFINEMENT FOR MESHFREE METHOD AND ITS APPLICATION IN SOIL CRACK ANALYSIS

When applied to crack analysis,the meshfree method requires a dense node distribution to get satisfactory result.An automatic node refinement procedure is presented in this paper for better describing crack propagation.The crack area is refined by generating nodes in isoparametric elements and then transferring them into corresponding background integration elements.The state values at new nodes and gauss integration points are obtained using finite element interpolation.Combining with the smeared crack model,the presented method can be used to simulate crack propagation in soil.A soil beam bending test is analyzed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.