Selecting beam elements

Several guidelines are provided for selecting beam elements.

  • First-order, shear-deformable (Timoshenko) beam elements (B21, B31) should be used in any simulation that includes contact.

  • If the transverse shear deformation is important, use Timoshenko beam elements (B21, B22, B31, B32).

  • If the structure is either very rigid or very flexible, the hybrid beam elements (B21H, B32H, etc.) available in Abaqus/Standard should be used in geometrically nonlinear simulations.

  • The Euler-Bernoulli (cubic) beams (B23, B33) available in Abaqus/Standard are very accurate for simulations that include distributed loading, such as dynamic vibration analyses.

  • Structures with open, thin-walled cross-sections should be modeled with the elements that use open-section warping theory (B31OS, B32OS) available in Abaqus/Standard.