Analysis of Thermoelastic Interaction in a Polymeric Orthotropic Medium Using the Finite Element Method.

Area of Science:

• Solid Mechanics
• Continuum Mechanics
• Computational Mechanics

Background:

• Understanding thermal relaxation is crucial for predicting material behavior under transient heating.
• Orthotropic, elastic polymeric materials exhibit complex responses to thermal loads.
• Existing models like classical dynamic coupling (CT), Lord-Shulman (LS), and Green and Lindsay (GL) offer different theoretical frameworks for thermal wave propagation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the impact of thermal relaxation durations on temperature, displacement, and stress fields.
• To compare the predictive capabilities of the Green and Lindsay (GL) model against CT and LS models.
• To analyze heat flux effects on a 2D polymeric orthotropic elastic medium.

Main Methods:

• Employing the finite element technique for numerical simulations.
• Utilizing eight-node isoparametric rectangular elements with three degrees of freedom per node.
• Applying an exponentially decaying heat flux pulse to the bounding surface of a half-space.

Main Results:

• Numerical results were generated and visualized for the polymeric, orthotropic medium.
• The study successfully demonstrated the differences in thermal and mechanical responses predicted by CT, LS, and GL models.
• The influence of thermal relaxation times was quantified through temperature, displacement, and stress distributions.

Conclusions:

• The Green and Lindsay model provides a distinct perspective on thermal relaxation effects compared to classical and Lord-Shulman models.
• Finite element analysis is a robust method for evaluating thermal-mechanical coupling in complex materials.
• The study highlights the importance of selecting appropriate thermoelastic models for accurate material response prediction.