Numerical and experimental studies on impact dynamics of a planar flexible multibody system

In this paper a computational methodology on impact dynamics of the flexible multibody system is presented. First, the floating frame of reference approach and nodal coordinates on the basis of finite element formulation are used to describe the kinematics of planar deformable bodies. According to the kinematic description of contact conditions, the contact constraint equations of planar flexible bodies are derived. Based on the varying topology technique the impact dynamic equations for a planar multibody system are established. Then the initial conditions of the equations in each contact stage are determined according to the discontinuity theory in continuum mechanics. The experiments between the aluminum rods are performed to check the correctness of the proposed method. Through the comparison between the numerical and experimental results the proposed method is validated. Experimental results also show that the impulse momentum method cannot accurately predict the complex impact dynamic phenomena and the continuous model may lead to a serious error when used to simulate the impact problems with significant wave propagation effects.