CONVERGENCE IN ELASTIC-STATIC ANALYSIS OF 3-DIMENSIONAL CONTINUA USING THE FINITE-DIFFERENCE METHOD WITH ARBITRARY GRIDS

The convergence of the finite difference method with arbitrary grids in the elastic-static analysis of various three-dimensional continua is considered. First an in-depth examination of the influence of discretization point arrangement and the shape of the grid on the entity of errors related to the procedure proposing an error evaluation and minimization method is carried out. Subsequently the similarities and differences of the procedure compared with the finite element method are shown and a computer code and significant numerical examples are given. The procedure makes it possible to eliminate the necessity of choosing linking diagrams between points and provides very good results even with a very small number of points. © 1990.