I have analyzed pure epoxy material with elasto-plastic material properties. I have defined the nonlinear plastic region using eq. plastic strain table. At the end of the analysis I get the global total strain energy (scalar) value but it is less than the real (experimental) value.
The figure below shows the true stress-true strain curves. Blue colored curve belongs to experimental data and the red colored curve belongs to results obtained after FE analysis.
In the elastic region curves almost coincide but in the plastic region there is huge strain energy difference.
By the way, I used 3D tetrahedron (element 157) for modeling epoxy.
The discrepancy could be in the material characterization. The FE results appear to yield before the experimental results. Are you confident in this material characterization? Have you correlated any other test results?
The discrepancy could be in the material characterization. The FE results appear to yield before the experimental results. Are you confident in this material characterization? Have you correlated any other test results?