Cad-Based Contact Modelling for Multibody Systems

Abstract

So far, the use of CAD-data for multibody simulation especially for contact problems is not well established. The well-known multibody simulation program ADAMS^{T M} has a restricted set of contact elements and only recently SIMPACK^{T M} offered a new module for contact simulation with a CAD-data import feature. So far little literature is available concerning the underlying methods and the geometric parametrization. On the one hand there are many methods and algorithms for CAGD, and on the other hand the theory for contact simulation is well developed. It is desirable to examine the combination of methods from both areas.