Real-time hybrid simulation based on vector form intrinsic finite element and field programmable gate array

The numerical substructure of a real-time hybrid simulation (RTHS) has been considerably simplified through condensation methods to relieve the burden incurred by computation. However, this simplification severely limits the application of RTHS to structures whose numerical parts are complex and require a large number of degrees of freedom (DOFs) to model. Thus, in this study, a vector form intrinsic finite element (VFIFE) analysis is introduced to RTHS with numerical substructures containing a large number of DOFs. A field programmable gate array (FPGA) is also employed to speed-up the numerical simulation of the VFIFE through parallel computing in RTHS. The characteristics of this parallel RTHS platform using VFIFE and FPGA are discussed in detail in this paper. A simple RTHS was carried out to verify the feasibility of this new platform, followed by a complex virtual RTHS to show its powerful computational capability.