Fixed point strategies for elastostatic frictional contact problems

Several fixed point strategies and Uzawa algorithms (for classical and augmented Lagrangian formulations) are presented to solve the unilateral contact problem with Coulomb friction. These methods are analysed, without introducing any regularization, and a theoretical comparison is performed. Thanks to a formalism coming from convex analysis, some new fixed point strategies are presented and compared with known methods. The analysis is first performed on continuous Tresca problem and then on the finite dimensional Coulomb problem derived from an arbitrary finite element method. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.