Three-dimensional Topology Optimization using the CATO Algorithm

Abstract

An application of the constrained adaptive topology optimization (CATO) algorithm is described for three-dimensional topology optimization of engineering structures. The enhanced assumed strain lower order solid finite element (FE) is used to evaluate the values of objective and constraint functions required in optimization process. The strain energy (SE) terms such as elastic and modal SEs are employed as the objective function to be minimized and the initial volume of structures is introduced as the constraint function. The SIMP model is adopted to facilitate the material redistribution and also to produce clearer and more distinct structural topologies. The linearly weighted objective function is introduced to consider both static and dynamic characteristics of structures. Several numerical tests are tackled and it is used to investigate the performance of the proposed three-dimensional topology optimization process. From numerical results, it is found to be that the CATO algorithm is easy to implement and extremely applicable to produce the reasonable optimum topologies for three dimensional optimization problems