Summary for version 7.6

General

• The documentation has been significantly revised to make the Zencrack analysis process simpler to understand.
• A new keyword, *ELEMENT, is introduced to allow a 20 noded target element to be replaced by 8 noded elements in the crack-blocks of the cracked mesh.
• A number of changes have been made to improve the use of the bk1 and bk2 files for detailed processing of output from spectrum load histories.
• A number of improvements have been made in the options available for defining minimum and maximum load systems.
• The spline fixup option on the CRACK FRONT keyword has been improved for cases where the crack front is not normal to the free surface. In addition the distribution of crack-blocks along the crack front no longer has to be uniform when the spline fixup is used.
• A number of improvements have been made in the surround fix option on the BOUNDARY SHIFT keyword.
• The calculation of displacement-based Ks can now be turned off.
• Changes in the error control scheme for defining the allowable step sizes between successive finite element analyses provide a faster start-up to the analysis with a reduction in the overall number of finite element analyses.
• The remote finite element execution facility for Windows installations that have the finite element code on a Linux or Unix machine has been improved.
• A "license roaming" capability is available with network licensing.
• Eight new user subroutines are included in this release. In addition a number of "utility functions" are included. These can be called from within user subroutines to access certain model data e.g. current coordinates of a node in the model etc.

Abaqus interface

• Three plug-ins are provided in this release for use with Abaqus/CAE and /Viewer. These plug-ins allow extraction of data from a model ready for use in the Zencrack input file and/or provide a visual confirmation that input data is correct.

Ansys interface

• The type of the Ansys uncracked mesh, either "normal" or "solid model", is now determined automatically.
• A considerable amount of change has been made to improve the handling of ESURF and TSHAP options.
• The .001 file that Zencrack uses to extract results from the Ansys analysis is added to the list of files that can be saved and renumbered on the *SAVE keyword.
• The *RESTART, TYPE=FE FILES option is enabled for "normal" Ansys analyses to allow a restart of an analysis without repeating the Ansys runs.
• Ansys solid model analyses can now be run using the remote f.e. capability.
• A new variable OPTIONS_ANSYS is added to the runzcr script to specify Ansys command line options that should be used when Zencrack executes an Ansys job, e.g. a specific Ansys product or number of processors for Ansys execution.

Marc interface

• Support is added for the Marc wide data format defined by the EXTENDED parameter in the uncracked mesh. The cracked mesh will always use the data format (normal or extended) of the uncracked mesh.