yade-users team mailing list archive

[Bruno Chareyre <bruno.chareyre@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

> If I can give my opinion (very little since I still have quite a lot 
> to learn in the time yet to come) we know that from the contact 
> mechanics when two particles get in contact (let consider only the 
> case of elastic flattening) we can approximate the area of interaction 
> as πa² (so a flat surface), where a is the current contact area. It is 
> an approximation since we are neglecting the curvature, but it is a 
> useful relation once we want to work out the interaction force due to 
> the interaction surface energy between two particles (it is the so 
> called derjiaguin approximation). In our case we do not have any 
> deformation at contact since we deal with rigid bodies, so I cannot 
> really see a clear connection. It was just to say why the cylinder 
> section. 
This is a third possible approach. Here you refer to the real contact 
area, wich is a surface, not a cylinder, and it is very small compared 
to the size of grains, right?

Bruno