Overlap detection in DEM

Jonatan Marin_20424

Dear All,

Hope you are well.

I have been getting into DEM packages and lately in EDEM where a question has come up regarding the Overlap detection and what is the criteria to consider that the contact is loading and unloading? is it when velocity approaches to zero?

Thanks in advance.

Best,

Jonatan

jpmorr

Typically it's relative normal velocity at the contact point that is used to differentiate between loading and unloading. In most simple contact models such as linear spring or Hertz-Mindlin where there is only a single loading path, then it's not so important to determine wheter it's actually loading or unloading. In many models, the damping is calculated based on the relative normal velocit as well.