New refined model for curved linear anisotropic rods with circular cross section

Abstract

Abstract An asymptotic reduction method is introduced to construct a curved rod theory for a general anisotropic linearized elastic material. For the sake of simplicity, the cross section is assumed to be circular. The starting point is Taylor expansions about the mean-line in curvilinear coordinates, and the goal is to eliminate the two spatial variables in the cross section in a pointwise manner in order to obtain a closed system for the displacement coefficients. We achieve this by using a Fourier series for the lateral traction condition together with the use of cylindrical coordinates in the cross section and by considering exact tridimensional equilibrium equation. We get a closed differential system of ten vector unknowns, and after a reduction process we obtain a differential system of the vector of the mean line displacement and twist angle. Six boundary conditions at each edge are obtained from the edge term in the tridimensional virtual work principle, and a unidimensional virtual work principle is also deduced from the weak forms of the rod equations. Through one example, we show that our theory gives more accurate results than the ones of both classical Euler-Bernoulli rod theory and Timoshenko rod theory. The displacement field is computed for two types of material symmetry : isotropy and transverse isotropy.