Finite element modelling of linear rolling contact problems

Abstract

The present work is devoted to the finite element modelling of linear hyperbolic rolling contact problems. The main equations encountered in rolling contact mechanics are reviewed in the first part of the paper, with particular emphasis on applications from automotive and vehicle engineering. In contrast to the common hyperbolic systems found in the literature, such equations include integral and boundary terms, as well as time-varying transport velocities, that require special treatment. In this context, existence and uniqueness properties are discussed within the theoretical framework offered by the semigroup theory. The second part of the paper is then dedicated to recovering approximated solutions to the considered problems, by combining discontinuous Galerkin finite element methods (DGMs) with explicit Runge–Kutta (RK) schemes of the first and second order for time discretisation. Under opportune assumptions on the smoothness of the sought solutions, and owing to certain generalised Courant–Friedrichs–Lewy (CFL) conditions, quasi-optimal error bounds are derived for the complete discrete schemes. The proposed algorithms are then tested on simple scalar equations in one space dimension. Numerical experiments seem to suggest the theoretical error estimates to be sharp.