About Contact

Contact features let you describe how surfaces from different part bodies affect one another when they contact during a simulation.

See Also
About General Contact
About Surface-Based Contact and Bonded Contact

The following basic contact formulations are available:

  • Bonded connections firmly attach surfaces to one another during the simulation, as if they were glued or welded together.
  • Sliding contact allows the surfaces to move and slide across each other without friction. The surfaces can slide only a small distance.
  • Thermal contact defines the heat transfer properties between two surfaces.

The methods for creating contact formulations are listed below:

General contact
General contact automatically finds all exterior surfaces in the model that can touch one another and simulates sliding contact between them. General contact simplifies the process of defining contact in your simulation, especially for a complex model with many interacting parts that move or deform during the simulation.
Bonded contact detection
Bonded contact detection identifies all potentially contacting surface pairs in the model and lets you automatically create surface-based bonded contact features for each pair.
Bonded contact
Bonded contact defines the interaction between one specific pair of surfaces as a bonded connection.
Contact detection
Contact detection identifies all potentially contacting surface pairs in the model and lets you automatically create surface-based contact features for each pair.
Surface-based contact
Surface-based contact defines the interaction between one specific pair of surfaces.

Depending on your simulation type, only some of these methods may be available. The table below describes which methods are available in each type of simulation, and the specific formulations of physical contact allowed.

Simulation Type General Contact Bonded Contact Detection Bonded Contact Contact Detection Surface-based Contact
Structural (linear) Sliding contact Bonded contact Bonded contact
Buckling Bonded contact Bonded contact
Frequency Bonded contact Bonded contact
Thermal Thermal contact Thermal contact