LAUSR

Abstract In this study, we exploit the flexibility and advantages of polyhedral finite elements in modeling 3D hollow concrete block revetments. In the present method, a new concept is proposed, in which the polyhedral elements are subdivided into sub-tetrahedrons through virtual nodes located at the centroids of the faces and element. Piecewise linear shape functions of polyhedral elements are constructed for the sub-tetrahedrons. Then, the shape functions are used to formulate the stiffness and mass matrices. By this way, the present approach yields lower computational cost than that of the standard polyhedral finite element method based on rational basis functions. The presented method suits well general polyhedral meshes including concave elements, which are used to model 3D complicated structures in design of coastal defenses system protection such as interlocking revetments. Reliability and effectiveness of the present approach are validated by the well-known commercial ANSYS software through static and dynamic analysis.