Finite element analysis of femur bone fracture – modelling and analysis

Abstract

Femoral fractures are frequent in adolescents and children, and most fractures occur within the centre of the bone, typically referred to as the femur shaft. Plate and screws are ideal fixation methods for femoral fractures close to the articular sur-faces. When using plates and screws, estimating the load on the plates and screws before starting treatment is important. The primary focus of this paper is the examination of fixation plates utilized in the treatment of femur bone fractures. The study employs the finite element method to conduct this analysis. Initial modelling of the femur bone is executed through the utilization of CATIA V5 software. Subsequently, the investigation transitions to the ANSYS R14.5 environment, where more in-depth analysis is carried out. The modelling of the fracture fixation plates is done on commercially available CAD software CATIA V5. The stress distribution of different biomaterials in the bone plate system is calculated when the system is subjected to compressive loads with varying healing times. Here we have used stainless steel (SS316-L), titanium alloy (Ti6Al4V) and magnesium alloy (AZ31). More focus was given to the magnesium alloy. Here a fracture gap of 1mm gap was taken for analysis. A comprehensive compressive force amounting to 750 N was applied to the bone-plate assembly during the simulation. This force magnitude corresponds to the approximate weight of an average human body.