Elastic deformation of components

First, the size of the available grid is defined (_nx,_ny) and the edge length of the square grid elements is selected (grid length in meters). Objects can now be drawn into the white area on the right-hand side of the window using the mouse. To do this, press the left mouse button while moving the mouse. Neighboring nodes are automatically connected by springs. Points can be deleted by pressing the right mouse button. Completely bordered areas can be filled in automatically by moving the mouse to the inner area and pressing the left and right mouse buttons simultaneously. The properties of each node are defined during drawing. These include the mass density of the material at this location, an external force acting on this point with its components (_Fx,_Fy) and the fixation of the point with regard to movement in the x and y directions. The modulus of elasticity is assumed to be the same for all points and is read in at startup. By moving the mouse over the nodal points, the properties of the respective point are displayed in the extra window, provided this is open (check the box at the bottom left). Pressing the Start button starts the calculation and the deformation of the body converges towards its equilibrium position. When this is reached, stop the calculation by pressing the Stop button. You can recognize the equilibrium position by the fact that the force on all moving nodes is zero and the displacements no longer change. The deformation is directly visible in the drawing. If it is very small, it can be magnified by moving the "Deflection magnification factor" slider to the right. The images can be saved as an image file (jpg or bmp) or printed out directly. Points at the edge of the image are always fixed (floor, wall, ceiling). Other points that are considered fixed are marked in the image with a thick black dot. Points on which an external force is acting are marked with a red dot.

During the calculation, the total force of all springs on each individual grid point is calculated. All grid points are then moved in the direction of the acting force by a distance proportional to the force/spring constant. As a result, the position of all points converges towards their equilibrium position (total force on each moving point is zero). The force on fixed points is not equal to zero.