An analysis of smoothed particle hydrodynamics

SPH (Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics) is a gridless Lagrangian technique which is appealing as a possible alternative to numerical techniques currently used to analyze high deformation impulsive loading events. In the present study, the SPH algorithm has been subjected to detailed testing and analysis to determine its applicability in the field of solid dynamics. An important result of the work is a rigorous von Neumann stability analysis which provides a simple criterion for the stability or instability of the method in terms of the stress state and the second derivative of the kernel function. Instability, which typically occurs only for solids in tension, results not from the numerical time integration algorithm, but because the SPH algorithm creates an effective stress with a negative modulus. The analysis provides insight into possible methods for removing the instability. Also, SPH has been coupled into the transient dynamics finite element code PRONTO, and a weighted residual derivation of the SPH equations has been obtained.