Investigation of factors influencing welding deformation of ship block by inherent strain analysis using idealized explicit FEM

It is impossible to avoid welding deformations when steel structures such as ships are assembled. Therefore, quantitative prediction and effective control of residual welding deformation are necessary. However, the current finite element analysis requires very long computational time and memory. To solve this problem, we have developed an inherent strain analysis method using idealized explicit FEM and have applied this proposed method to a ship block model. The simulated results agree well with the measured deformation. Furthermore, the influence of various factors on the welding deformation of targeted ship block is also investigated.