An Augmented Alagrangian Formulation for the Finite Element Solution of Contact Problems.

A solution method for small deformation frictionless contract problems is developed. First, a review of various solution methods for contact problems is given. Next, a detailed discussion is made of the augmented Lagrangian method. Then, the finite element implementation is discussed. Finally, sample problems and their solutions are presented to demonstrate the usefulness of the method. Both the static and dynamic solution algorithms are described in this report. Keywords: Structural analysis; Lagrange multipliers; and Penalty functions. (Author)