Theoretical equivalence and numerical performance of T3s and MITC3 plate finite elements

This paper will compare T3γs and MITC3 elements, both these two elements are three-node triangular plate bending elements with three degrees of freedom per node. The formulation of the T3γs and MITC3 elements is rather simple and has already been widely used. This paper will prove that the shear strain formulation of these two elements is identical even though they are obtained from two different methods. A single element is used to test the formulation of shear strain matrices. Numerical tests for circular plate cases compared with the exact solutions and with DKMT element will complete this review to verify the performances and show the convergence of these two elements.