On the Corotational Beam Element Formulation in Large Deformation Analysis

This paper sheds more light on the co-rotational element formulation for beams with uniform cross-section. The co-rotational elements are commonly used in problems in which a structure undergoes a large deformation. In this study, the foregoing element obeys the Euler-Bernoulli beam assumptions. Unlike the formulations presented in the literature, in this paper, a number of local nodal coordinates are employed which makes the kinematic description of the deformed beam much easier without the need of expressing any complicated relations. In this regard, via a clamped planar beam as a case study, the methodology is implemented step-by-step, and the results are compared with the ones calculated analytically and by means of elliptic integrals. Then, the methodology is briefly formulized for 3D cases as well. At the end, as a second case study, the large deformation analysis is conducted on a simply supported planar beam as well.