Limit analysis for a general class of yield conditions

The paper describes a generalisation of the programming method described by Ponter and Carter (1997) for the evaluation of optimal upper bounds on the limit load of a body composed of a rigid/perfectly plastic material. The method is based upon similar principles to the `Elastic Compensation' method which has been used for design calculations for some years but re-interpreted as a non-linear programming method. A sufficient condition for convergence is derived which relates properties of the yield surface to those of the linear solutions solved at each iteration. The method is demonstrated through an application to a Drucker–Prager yield condition in terms of the Von Mises effective stress and the hydrostatic pressure. Implementation is shown to be possible using the user routines in a commercial finite element code, ABAQUS. The examples chosen indicate that stable convergent solutions may be obtained. There are, however, limits to the application of the method if isotropic linear solutions are used for an isotropic yield surface. In an accompanying paper (Ponter and Engelhardt, 2000) the method is extended to shakedown and related problems.