PGAPEC

Bulk Data Entry Defines electrical resistance properties for the gap elements (CGAP or CGAPG) in electrical analysis.

Format

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
PGAPEC PID KCEC KOEC TCID

Examples

Manual specification of KCER:
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
PGAPEC 2 1E6
Automatic determination of KCER:
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
PGAPEC 2 AUTO

Definitions

Field Contents SI Unit Example
PID Property identification number. 1

No default (Integer > 0)
KCEC Conductance for the closed gap. 2
Real > 0.0
AUTO

No default
KOEC Conductance for the open gap. 2

Default = 0.0 (Real ≥ 0.0)
TCID Identification number of a TABLED# entry. This table specifies total conductance based on gap clearance. TCID overrides KCEC for closed contact. 3

Default = Blank ((Integer > 0)

Comments

  1. PGAPEC provides electrical resistance for CGAP/CGAPG elements. The PID of a PGAPEC entry must match a PID with an existing PGAP.
  2. KCEC represents gap conductance values for closed gaps. Theoretically, while higher conductance values enforce a perfect conductor, excessively high values may cause poor conditioning of the conduction matrix. If such conditions are observed, you may need to decrease the value of gap conductance. When gap is open, no electricity goes through the gap and the resistance is infinite (unless KOEC is defined). To stabilize conduction matrix, KCEC*1.0E-14 is used for open gap electrical resistance.

    To facilitate reasonable values of KCEC, automatic calculation (KCEC=AUTO) is supported. This determines the value of KCEC for each gap element using the conductance of surrounding elements.

  3. TCID points to a TABLED# entry that specifies total conductance based on gap clearance. TCID overrides KCEC for closed contact. For coupled thermal contact analysis where nonlinear static subcase provides contact status for thermal contact, TCID overrides KOEC for open GAP, and KCEC for closed GAP. TCID is ignored for linear CGAP/CGAPG elements.
  4. Electrical contact with FREEZE status, AUTO conductance is determined by OptiStruct regardless of the actual contact status (open or closed) based on geometry.
  5. Electrical Contact Analysis via PCONTEC and PGAPEC is supported for Steady-State Electric Analysis and Multi-Steady Electric Analysis.
  6. This card is represented as a property in HyperMesh.