MinuteSim-generated model
Spherical indentation
A rigid sphere presses into an aluminium plate clamped along all four edges. Follow the plate displacement during 12 mm of sphere travel.
The plate is shown at its computed shell mid-surface, with no thickness extrusion or displacement enlargement. The translucent sphere is drawn from its prescribed input motion. Color shows nodal plate displacement u_z on the original −11 to 0 mm scale; small positive values use the upper-limit color.
At the prescribed 12 mm sphere travel, the plate reaches a minimum thickness of 0.728 mm from an initial 1 mm. These values describe the loaded state; unloading is not simulated.
Model and loading
Clamped aluminium plate
A 100 × 100 × 1 mm plate uses a 50 × 50 mesh of 2,500 Quad4 · fully integrated assumed strain shell elements, with five through-thickness integration points. All six degrees of freedom are fixed along its four edges.
Prescribed sphere motion
The sphere radius is 10 mm. Its initial surface is 1.5 mm above the plate mid-surface. A prescribed displacement curve moves the sphere downward 12 mm in 1.3 ms, with a smooth 0.2 ms start before motion at 10 m/s.
Representative aluminium properties: E = 70 GPa, ν = 0.33, density = 2,700 kg/m³, initial yield stress = 250 MPa and tangent modulus = 500 MPa, with isotropic hardening.
Loaded state at 1.3 ms
| Quantity | Computed value |
|---|---|
| Sphere travel | 12.000 mm |
| Centre displacement u_z | −10.501 mm |
| Minimum shell thickness | 0.7275 mm |
| Maximum effective plastic strain | 0.417 |
Model origin and scope
The mesh and input deck were generated for MinuteSim using representative dimensions and material values. The run reaches the specified 1.3 ms end time in single precision (FP32) on an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060.
This example demonstrates displacement-driven spherical rigid-wall loading and shell plastic deformation. No independent reference solution, contact-force comparison, unloading response or fracture model is presented. It is separate from the Hertz elastic-block accuracy comparison.
This spherical-wall configuration does not provide velocity-curve input, wall-energy accounting or spherical-wall force-history output.
SUPPORTED · Configured capability demonstration. Results apply to the model and loading described here.