In LS-DYNA, there are different material models and I’ve found it difficult to choose the proper material model. Would you please give me some suggestions in selecting the proper material model?

It depends on the specific requirement. There are two popular material models, i.e.

*MAT_3_PARAMETER_BARLAT (MAT 36), and *MAT_TRANSVERSELY_ANISOTROPIC_ELASTIC_PLASTIC (MAT 37)

Mat 37 is just Hill’s 48 planar isotropic material model, only the R_BAR (the average value of R’s) is used. Hence, it cannot be used to analyze the earring effect in deep drawing process and can under estimate thickening and thinning.

Mat 36 is more accurate, and it considers planar anisotropy (i.e., R0, R45, and R90 are required). It should be noted that increased accuracy is accompanied by an increase in computational speed. This material model is nearly five times as expensive as MAT 37.

Mat 37 is used extensively within the stamping industry. With the development of faster cpu’s for the various computer architectures, it is possible that Mat 36 will become more popular in stamping simulations which require accurate predictions.