LS-DYNA features:

Staged Construction
*CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION etc

This presentation is a basic introduction to Staged Construction in LS-DYNA. See

also the Remarks for *CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION in the Keyword
Manual.
 Staged construction: what is it?
• Break the analysis into periods of time that can be referenced in
loading definitions and rerun separately
• Introduce parts sequentially during the analysis, including self-
weight, e.g. new construction
• Remove parts at particular times during the analysis, e.g.
excavating soil, removing temporary props
• With the explicit analysis method, we use time scaling to reduce
the analysis time to the order of 10-100 seconds, i.e. there is a
scaling factor between real-life time and analysis time.
• With the short analysis time comes a risk of introducing
unrealistic dynamic effects. These are reduced by:
- Applying and removing loads gradually (ramp, not step)
- Applying damping (e.g. *DAMPING_GLOBAL)

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 Staged construction analysis: why?

• Set up correct initial condition for main analysis

- E.g. prepare model for a seismic analysis
- In-situ stresses/deformation may be dependent on construction sequence
- Set up correct stresses in load-bearing versus non-loadbearing walls
- Retro-fit materials should not be stressed by the weight of the structure
• Analyse conditions during construction
- Examine risk of failures when structure is incomplete
- Soil heave/settlement in response to excavation and new construction

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 Example: non-loadbearing walls
Complete structure Add gravity 2-way spanning slab; all
present at time=0 walls equally loaded

Incomplete structure 1-way spanning slab;

present at time=0 Add gravity Fill gap walls differentially loaded
 Example
• Parts added sequentially
• As each part is added, its
self-weight is automatically
ramped up from zero to its full
Start of analysis End of Stage 1
value

Gravity load 3rd storey

Time
2nd storey
Time
1st storey
End of Stage 2 End of Stage 3
STAGE 1 STAGE 2 STAGE 3
Time
5
 Staged Construction Keywords
Main keywords:
• *CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION
- Which stages should be run; gravity acceleration to be applied

• *DEFINE_CONSTRUCTION_STAGES
- Define the start and end times of each stage

• *DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART (_SET)
- Define the stages at which parts become active or are removed

Subsidary keywords (not usually defined in the keyword file, but LS-DYNA
creates them automatically in response to the above):
• *LOAD_STIFFEN_PART
• *LOAD_REMOVE_PART
• *LOAD_GRAVITY_PART

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 Example: keywords
Initial model contains all the
elements, including parts that
become active later in the
analysis

Example: Part ID 6
becomes active at
Stage 5, starting at
analysis time 4.0,
and the gravity
load will be
ramped up over the
next 0.5 seconds.

Adding/deleting elements, and application of gravity

loading, is managed automatically by LS-DYNA
 Acceleration due to gravity is defined here. Gravity will be applied to all
Notes parts defined under *DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART. Do
NOT use *LOAD_BODY in addition to staged construction.

The analysis does not have to

begin at Stage 1. In this case,
the analysis begins at Stage 5
so the analysis time will begin
at 4.0 (not at 0.0).

The first stage MUST begin at

Time = 0.

This is how to define a part that is present

throughout the analysis, and receives gravity
load from
*CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION.

Parts omitted from this list will be present

throughout the analysis, but will not receive
gravity loading from
*CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION.
 Active, Dormant, and Removed Parts
• “Active” is the normal condition for elements in an LS-DYNA analysis.
• “Dormant” is a state specific to Staged Construction and occurs before the
analysis reaches the stage where the part becomes active (STGA on
*DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART).
- The elements are present in the analysis and are processed by LS-DYNA in the
normal way, but any stresses or forces generated are scaled by the factor given on
*CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION – 1.0e-6 by default.
- In the d3plot file, dormant elements are flagged as “deleted” so that post-processors
automatically blank them out.
- When they become active, the stress and history variables are re-initialized.

• Parts are removed when the analysis reaches the stage STGR on
*DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART. These elements are deleted
from the analysis and are no longer processed by LS-DYNA.
- To reduce any dynamic response, gravity load is automatically ramped down to zero
before the elements are deleted

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 Different behaviour in LS-DYNA R11 versus R10
• When a Part becomes active, the behaviour is different in R11 onwards
compared to R10 and previous.
• In R11 onwards, the stiffness and strength jump immediately to their full
values.
• In R10 and previous, the stiffness and strength were ramped up from zero in
the same way as the gravity loading.
- Disadvantage: unrealistic deformations can occur while the part is still
soft/weak.
• In all versions, the gravity load ramps up as described in other slides.
• In all versions, the stiffness and strength are ramped down before removal of
the Part (due to STGR on *DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART)
• If desired, the R11 behaviour can be obtained in previous versions by the
methods described on the next slide.

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 Overriding the default behaviour
The behaviour of *DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART
described in previous slides can be overridden if desired:
• The variation of stiffness and strength versus time can be
overridden using *LOAD_STIFFEN_PART with a loadcuvre
- e.g. to make a Part reach its full stiffness and strength more quickly than the
ramp time defined on *DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART.
• The variation of gravity load with time can be overridden using
*LOAD_GRAVITY_PART with a loadcurve
- e.g. to ramp up the gravity load slower than the ramp time defined on
*DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART.
- e.g. to apply less or more than the default amount of gravity loading.

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 Applying other types of loading
• Gravity load is applied automatically as described in previous
slides
• Other loading (e.g. *LOAD_NODE, *LOAD_SEGMENT_SET
etc) can be defined in the keyword file in the normal way.
- It is recommended to use *DEFINE_CURVE to ramp up the
loading, e.g.:

Load *DEFINE_CURVE
100
0.0 0.0
1.0 0.0
1.5 1.0
100.0 1.0
Time

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 Initial stress: beginning of first Stage

• To minimise dynamic effects, it is recommended to set an initial

stress state in equilibrium with the initial loading.
• For parts that experience loading that ramps up from zero, no
initial stress is required because the initial loading is zero.
• For parts that are active and receiving full gravity loading at the
start of the first stage (STGA=0 on
*DEFINE_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION_PART), it is desirable to
define initial stresses balancing the gravity load, for example using
*INITIAL_STRESS_DEPTH. This method is recommended for
soil.

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 Timestep control (explicit analysis method)

• Active elements have the usual influence on timestep and/or

mass-scaling.
• Dormant elements are treated as having their usual mass, but
reduced stiffness; hence the timestep calculated for these elements
is much larger than if the same elements were active.
• If no elements are active (e.g. at the start of the analysis) then
LS-DYNA may set a very large timestep. Avoid this possibility
using LCTM on *CONTROL_TIMESTEP to define a maximum
timestep size for the analysis.

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 Running or rerunning a subset of stages
• At the end of each stage (as defined on
*DEFINE_CONSTRUCTION_STAGES), LS-DYNA writes a file
named (for example) end_stage001_dynain for the end of stage 1.
• These dynain files contain the information needed to start a new
analysis from the same state: deformed node coordinates, stress and
history variables for every element, etc.

Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3

Analysis 1

end_stage001_dynain end_stage002_dynain end_stage003_dynain

Instructions for preparing this keyword

Analysis 2
file are given on the next slide…
end_stage002_dynain

0.0 1.0 2.0 3.0 Time

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 Running or rerunning a subset of stages
Initial keyword file (Analysis 1): Copy Keyword file for Analysis 2:

*CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION *CONTROL_STAGED_CONSTRUCTION
0,1,3 (run from stage 1 to stage 3) 0,2,2 (run from stage 2 to stage 2)
*CONTROL_... *CONTROL_...
*DATABASE_... *DATABASE_...
*MAT_... *MAT_... Remove keywords
*SECTION_... *SECTION_... that are present in the
*PART_... *PART_... dynain file and any
*NODE *NODE *INITIAL cards; add
end_stage001_dynain *INCLUDE
*ELEMENT_... *ELEMENT_...
contains: reference to the
*DEFINE_... *DEFINE_...
*INITIAL_... *INITIAL_... dynain file
*BOUNDARY_SPC
*BOUNDARY_SPC *BOUNDARY_SPC
*NODE
*LOAD_... *LOAD_...
*ELEMENT_...
*INCLUDE
*INITIAL_STRESS…
(path)/end_stage001_dynain
*INITIAL_(other)_...

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 Limitations
• Staged Construction capabilities are available only for certain
element types and formulations.
• This information applies to versions up to and including R10.
• *ELEMENT_SOLID: ELFORM=1,2,10,15
• *ELEMENT_SHELL: ELFORM=1-11,16,17
• *ELEMENT_BEAM: ELFORM=1,2,3,6,9,11,12
• Further ELFORMs, and support for *ELEMENT_TSHELL, will
be added in future LS-DYNA releases.

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