Reaction Loads: This Should Be Embarrassingly Simple…

[MarkSutcliffe]

I'm largely self taught on this software so sometimes I run into problems I think should be easy, but I have a hard time with. Please help!

How can I get loading on a bonded face joint to calculate bolt loads?

I have a solid model with all bonded joints. Some of those joints are bolted/pinned in reality. I’m trying to extract the shear and tensile loads on those joints to do a hand calc on the bolts/pins. But I select the face that is bonded in the model, go to Reactions: Internal Forces: Y (my shear axis) is giving me a sum of 1.9 lbf. This is not realistic (I did a simple beam model to verify that thought). I thought maybe it was a heavy torsion on that face and was summing near zero. The results are with a range of 2.3E-2, min of 5.91E-4 lbf, and max of 2.4E-2 lbf so that is not the case. I had a couple other ideas, but nothing worked out.

I've included an example screen shot. The mating part to that face is hidden for clarity.

I’m running out of time (my report is due Monday by end of day) and I’m getting desperate. Again any help would be greatly appreciated! Cheers!

[AstroJohnPE · Accepted solution]

Hello Mark,

Sorry if this is too late for your deadline.

The first step is to disable the reaction force calculation for one of the parts; otherwise, the sum of the reaction forces are equal and opposite and should add to 0. See this thread: http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Autodesk-Simulation-Mechanical/Extracting-Forces-and-Moments/m-p/36299...

The second step is to review the results. I'm not sure what version you are using, so refer to the documentation to find out which result you want to look at. (I'm guessing it is "Reaction Force (Negative)" that you want to use which appears in version 2012 and later ribbon style menus).

[MarkSutcliffe]

Interesting. This wasn't so straight forward after all. I feel a little better. Thank you very much for your help. I had to submit my report using a beams model seperate from the solid model I used for stress. I think that will be sufficient, but your reply will be extremely valuable in the future!!!